LIBRARY OF CONGRESS. 




^? 

Shelf j£l&6 

UNITED STATES OF AMERICA. 





PASTOR CHARLES H. SPURGEON 






SPURGEON'S GOLD. 



NEW SELECTIONS 

PROM THE 

WORKS 



V.-W P 



OF 



0. H. SPURGBON, 

PASTOR OP THE METROPOLITAN TABERNACLE, LONDON, ENGLAND, 

SELECTED BY 

EDMOND HEZ SWEM, 

PASTOR SECOND BAPTIST CHURCH, "WASHINGTON, D C. 




388 
9 



WASHINGTON, D. C. : 
JUDD & DETWEILER, PRINTERS 

1888. 



bGCP 



Entered according to Act of Congress in the year 1888, by 

EDMOND HEZ SWEM, 
In the office of the Librarian of Congress, at Washington. 



PREFACE 



Spurgeon's Gold contains more than 2,400 selections — 
many of them the best of proverbs — from the works of 
Charles H. Spurgeon, the greatest of London preachers, 
whose sermons and books are read all over the world. 

Having visited London twice and been frequently 
charmed by his marvelous voice and benefitted by his won- 
derful words of wisdom, I desire that his best thoughts may 
be read and remembered by those who cannot hear him 
and have not the leisure to search the voluminous works of 
the prince of speakers, great author, philanthropist, and 
educator. 

I can never forget the petition of the prayer Pastor 
Spurgeon offered for me in the auditorium of the Metro- 
politan Tabernacle, London (the night before re-embark- 
ing for home), after I had spoken to his people and sung a 
solo: " May he bring thousands of souls to the feet of the 
Saviour and keep them there." 

Dear Reader, pray that the Lord may make me a winner 
of many souls, and that this book may be helpful to both 
saints and sinners. 

So oft' you heard 
Of Him who lived and died and lives again, 
Now trust* in Him who saves believing men, 
'Though oft' they've erred. 

Edmond Hez Swem. 
Washington, D. C. 



* Read John III : 16. 



INDEX 



Adversity, 31, 80, 120 

Afflictions, 10, 42, 58, 113, 137, 141, 170, 191 

Age, 5 

Agnostic, 77 

Alms, 145, 149 

Ancestors, 172 

Anger, 9, 110, 124, 186 

Angels, 83, 100, 187 

Anticipation, 48 

Anxiety, 114, 146,185 

Appetite, 1 

Atonement, 141, 189 

Attainment, 56 

Avarice, 104 

Babes, 140 

Backsliders, 24, 34, 63, 107, 189 
Backsliding, 84, 176 
Baptism, 5, 93, 126, 148 
Beggarv, 171 
Belief, 4 

Believers, 13, 28, 43 
Bees, 89 

Bible, 3, 7, 11, 13, 14, 15, 24, 25, 28, 40, 41, 
53, 77, 80. 105, 153 
Blessings, 108, 118,143 
Bliss, 41 
Blood, 147 

Boasters, 79, 101 * 

Boasting, 14, 40, 52, 62, 93, 103, 105, 146 
Body, 17, 27 
Boys, 169 
Brain, 125 
Brethren, 114 
Brotherhood, 113 
Brothers, 142 
Business, 64, 116, 128, 167 

Care, 196 
Censure, 71 
Centuries, 168 
Character, 42, 142, 175 
Charity, 2, 30, 116,135 
Chastening, 11, 185 
Cheerfulness, 58 
Childhood, 104 

Children, 7, 17, 26, 33, 34, 35, 56, 58, 67, 

86, 114, 128, 132, 135, 138,143, 148, 

151, 152, 153, 186 

Christ,- 45, 96, 129, 189 

Christian, 3, 13, 18, 23, 27, 29, 45, 48, 54, 

61, 98, 108, 113, 118, 130 193, 198 

Christ's Second Coming, 2, 5, 19, 22, 47, 

65, 97, 100, 107, 125, 131, 133, 135, 

142,154, 109 

Church, 35, 36, 37, 42, 57, 64, 84, 89, 91, 

100, 115, 173, 197 



Church Members, 67, 79 

Comfort, 7, 190 

Comforters, 158, 160 

Common Sense, 8, 45, 120 

Competition, 129 

Complaining, 183 

Confession, 8, 11, 72 

Confidence, 135, 144 

Congregation, 170 

Commandments, 73, 87, 136 

Consequence, 55 

Conscience, 33, 86, 90, 108, 134, 174, 188 

Consolation, 124 

Contentment, 14, 37, 62, 98, 114, 185, 191 

Conversion, 40, 44, 75, 95, 118 

Covenant, 165 

Covetousness, 34, 155 

Co-workers, 116 

Critics, 38 

Cross, 23, 50, 141, 155, 162, 170 

Crucifixion, 80 

Death, 27, 29, 46, 51, 55, 62, 77, 81, 119, 122, 
144, 145, 146, 162, 170, 173, 177, 196 
Debts, 10, 13, 14, 26,62, 68, 111, 128 
Deceit, 41, 70, 103 
Deceivers, 137 
Departed Friends, 71 
Depravity, 57 
Devil, 4 
Devils, 180 
Devotion, 42, 179 
Difficulties, 23, 115 
Dignity, 110 
Diligence, 64 
Disappointments, 43 
Disciple, 112 
Disciples, 171 
Disobedience, 76 
Discouragements, 20, 51 
Dishonesty, 60 
Dispute, 77 
Distrust, 76 

Debts, 10, 26, 87, 128, 155, 156, 173 
Doctors, 24 
Doctrine. 195 

Doubts, 10, 26, 87, 128, 155, 156, 173 
Dreams, 117, 167 
Dress, 140 
Drones, 4 
Drunkards, 16 
Duplicity, 189 
Duty, 33 
Dying, 3, 8, 17, 29, 38, 57, 77, 107, 195 

Earnestness, 62 



VI 



INDEX. 



Economy, 15, 104, 110 
Encouragement, 88, 128, 150 
Endurance, 119, 183, 157 
Enemies, 176 
Entertainments, 71 
Enthusiasm, 11, 79 
Eternal Life, 152 
Eternity, 3, 92 
Evolution, 115 
Exaggeration, 71 
Example, 28, 07 
Expectations, 95 
Experience, 19, 39, SO, 117, 179 
Eyes, 39 

Faces, 83 

Faith, 13, 14, 15, 23, 28, 29, 36, 56, 62, 66, 
69, 72, 75, 81, 85, 117, 127, 130, 136, 
151, 155, 164, 165, 188, 190, 197 
Faithfulness, 163 
Familv, 140 
Family Worship, 173 
Fashion, 142 
Fate 54 

Faults, 5, 13. 17, 43, 68, 78, 110, 199 
Feelings 147 
Fear, 67, 77, 84 
Fellowship, 166 
Fighting, 161 
Filthy Lucre, 134 
Flattery, 124 
Flowers, 9 
Friendless, 166, 
Folly, 67 

Fools, 20, 25, 27, 73, 109, 113, 120, 131, 138. 

142, 147, 161 
Forgiveness, 79 
Foundations, 63 
Free Grace, 150 
Friends, 11, 29, 40, 51, 103 
Friendship, 99, 105 
Fretting, 187 
Funerals. 126 
Future, 75 

tfain, 9, 78, 145 
Generosity, 31 
Gifts, 20 
Giving, 1, 11, 12 
Gladness, 131, 145 

God, 2, 9, 13, 18, 19, 24, 26, 29, 35, 51, 52, 

56, 81 
Godline-s, 7, 16,44 
Gold, 34, 50, 89, 95, 199 
Good Deeds, 188, 
Good Works, 113, 114 
Gospel, 23, 42, 59, 63, 66, 78, 91, 105, 106, 
112, 119, 123, 135, 143, 146, 165, 170, 

171 
Grace, 15, 32, 167, 195 
Graves, 135 
Griefs, 174 
Growth, 40 
Gruffness, 4 
Grumbling, 29, 50 

Happiness, 31, 46, 59, 66, 68, 93, 107, 116, 

130, 138, 140, 141, 144, 149, 171, 

191, 200 



Harlot, 37 
Hatred, 43 
Health, 41, 123 
Heart, 1, 32, 66, 162, 163, 167 
Heaven, 6, 14, 19, 20, 22, 24, 38, 41, 07, 69, 
75, 82, 93, 104, 109, 148, 161 107, 
174, 180, 181 
Hell, 1, 25, 43, 145, 197, 198 
Help, 16, 21, 53 
History, 2, 122 

Holy Spirit, 22, 45, 48, 126, 182, 188 
Honor, 141 
Holiness, 100 
Home, 45, 76, 96, 188 
Hope, 4, 7, 8, 10, 25, 49, 70, 92, 105, 174 
Humility, 119, 182, 198 
Human Body, 9 
Husbands, 14, 26, 105 
Hypocrisy, 55, 82, 

Hypocrites, 15, 17, 26, 37, 104, 123, 157, 

178 

Idlers, 33, 34 

Idolatry, 161, 171 

Idols, 51, 54, 72, 112 

Ignorance, 13, 15, 160 

Infidels, 117 

Influence, 1, 3, 76, 78. 158 

Intemperance, 2, 58, 91, 92, 152 

Imagination, 61, 143 

Immanuel, 6 

Immortality, 116 

Imperfection, 12, 20, 42 

Jealousy, 60 

Jesus, 4, 5, 11, 19, 21, 30, 100, 113, 119 

John, III : 16, 79 

Jokes, 123 

Joys, 58, 75, 84, 168 

Judging, 137, 147, 155 

Kiss, 193 
Knowledge, 174 

Labor, 87 
Language, 64 
Lawyers, 122 
Laziness, 39, 118 
Liars, 47, 81 
Liberality, 113 
Life, 1, 52, 142 
Living, 66, 68 
Loafers, 30 
London, 132, 149 
Lord's Supper, 5, 126 
Love, 7, 8, 14, 16, 18, 21, 22, 23, 30, 56, 59, 
63,64,78,95,115 
Luxury, 155 ' 
Lying, 170 

Malice, 42 
Man, 1, 8 
Manhood, 144, 145 
Manna, 168 

Marriage, 67, 121, 129, 195 
Martyrs, 67 
Meditation, 4, 162, 176 
Men, 27, 59, 147, 191 
Men-pleasers, 160 



INDEX 



VII 



Mercy, 56, 78, 197 

Microscope, 118 

Ministers, 49 

Miracles, 61, 1G8, 197 

Miser, 85 

Missions, 43 

Missionaries, 12, 135, 149 

Mistakes, 3 

Mocking, 128 

Money, 21, 22, 42, 84, 112, 119, 187 

Mothers, 123, 127, 139, 194 

Motives, 149 

Murder, 08 

Murmuring, 184 

Nations, 158 

Nature, 199 

New Converts, 113 

New Birth, 93, 156 

Newspapers, 61 

Night, 56 

Non-workers, 61 

Obedience, 13, 21, 44, 57, 60, 138, 194 

Occupation, 85 

Oddness, 138 

Old Age, 13,69,190 

Old Men, 104,122 

Ordinances, 76 

Pain, 21, 25 

Paradise, 178 

Passions, 195 

Patience, 18, 20, 66, 133, 146 

Perfection, 11, 12, 77, 149, 152, 156 

Persecution, 45, 199 

Perseverance, 5, 18, 30, 33, 06, 129 

Philosophy, 157, 158 

Piety, 84, 171 

Pilgrimage, 182 

Poverty, 19, 21, 39,49 

Praise, 18, 39, 50, 70, 71, 189, 195 

Prayer Meeting, 17 

Preachers, 34, 68 

Preaching, 9, 28, 67, 99, 110, 115 

Prayer, 3, 4, 5, 7, 9, 11, 1-2, 14, 17, 29, 3D, 
33, 38, 41, 45, 47, 48, 49, 50, 55, 57, 
62, 66, 74, 76, 86, 95, 106, 111, 112, 
124, 126, 131, 133, 134, 1159, 141, 
149, 156, 157, 158, 160, 163, 168, 
181, 184, 186, 189, 190, 196, 197 

Pride, 22, 41, 45, 48, 57, 163, 183 

Profanity, 64, 116, 127 

Promises, 24, 25, 26, 27, 31, 53, 61, 131, 
140, 162, 183, 184, 186, 189 

Prosperity, 21, 112, 198 

Providence, 48, 112, 138, 162, 165, 173, 200 

Psalm^l42, 191 

Prudence, 145, 164 

Punishment, 8, 166 

Purity, 16 

Quarrels, 155 

Redemption, 9 
Regret, 55 

Rejoicing, 39, 43, 54, 74 
Religion, 10, 26, 30, 36,45, 75, 78, 83, 86, 
88, 117, 120, 121, 140, 160, 172, 191, 
196, 198 



Repentance, 8, 190 
Resignation, 116 
Results, 113 
Revised Version, 106 
Resurrection, 16, 25, 54, 65, 82, 92, 123 
Rewards, 5, 11, 23, 40, 46, 94, 110, 112, 

118, 156, 190 

Sabbath, 143 

Sacrifice, 172 

Saints, 105, 107, 109, 119, 131, 167, 169, 

183, 188, 190 

Salvation, 3, 4, 7, 10, 18, 21, 44, 69 

Sanctification, 146, 195 

Satan, 22, 32, 34, 47, 54, 56, 72, 104, 107, 

160,167, 188 

Saviour, 9, 31 

Scripture, 146, 191 

Sceptics, 101 

Scepticim, 145, 165 

Second Advent, 137, 146, 164 

Secrets, 44, 129 

Self-denial, 30, 144 

Selfishness, 48 

Self-righteousness, 103 

Sermons, 24, 26. 39, 69, 109, 200 

Sickness, 77, 132, 144, 194, 196 

Silence, 32, 35, 40 

Sin, 2, 3, 5, 7, 10, 12, 14, 15, 16, 17, 18, 21, 
24, 26, 27, 28, 29, 31, 36, 37, 38, 41, 
42, 44, 46, 47, 49, 54, 56, 57, 59, 60, 
63, 65, 72, 74, 77, 78, 81, 84, 93, 109, 
110, 114, 124, 129, 134, 136, 144, 
179, 184, 199 

Singing, 30, 104, 114, 121, 168, 194 

Sinners, 2, 10, 11, 33, 47, 49, 50, 56, 61, 70, 

80, 106, 151 

Slander, 169 

Sleep, 179 

Sorrow, 9, 51, 65, 127 

Soul, 18, 25, 65 

Soul-winning, 32, 33 

Students, 52 

Success, 54,99, 136, 162 

Suffering, 32, 54 

Swindling, 2 

Sympathy, 3, 18, 122, 164, 169, 196 

Tale-bearing, 188 
Talents, 58, 196 
Teachers, 148, 196 
Tears, 19 

Temper, 31, 84, 149, 151, 175 
Temptation, 2, 12, 43, 65, 122, 130, 143, 
161, 163, 164, 167, 168, 170 
Teetotalers, 127 
Thankfulness, 166 
Thief, 90, 125 
Thinking, 14, 22, 112 
Thoughts, 4, 6, 12, 16, 22, 28, 45, 46, 49, 
50, 66, 71, 77, 79, 85, 88, 92, 105, 
137, 138, 146 
Transgression, 96, 197 
Tongues, 22, 25, 83 
Trials, 20, 59, 111, 117, 144, 155 
Trinity, 175, 195 
Trouble, 183, 200 
Trust, 50, 52, 70 
Truth, 22, 26, 27, 32, 109, 116, 161 



VIII 



INDEX. 



Unbelief, 34, 36, 173, 186 
Ungodly, 46 
Upstarts, 194 
Usefulness, 15, 63, 65 

Vexations, 87 
Villiany, 142 

Waiting, 1, 198 
Wasting, 128 
Watching, 68 
Weakness, 168 
Wealth, 35, 42, 71, 125, 187 
Whims, 155 
Whosoever, 73 
Wills, 123 
Wisdom, 118, 162 



Wit. 129 

Wives, 26, 47, 74, 81, 87, 90, 92, 139 

Woman, 187 

Words, 55, 58, 107 

Work, 2, 5, 27, 41, 53, 73, 132, 181 

Workmen, 163, 165 

World, 117, 130, 151, 165, 166, 182 

Worldlings, 160 

Worldliness, 115, 134 

Worship, 15, 16, 21, 162, 169, 180 

Young Converts, 117, 130, 136, 141, 154, 

179 
Young Men, 55, 140, 153 

Zeal, 21, 24, 41, 139 



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SPURGEONS GOLD. 



Right principles are spiritual gold, and he that hath them, 
and is ruled by them, is the man who truly lives. 

The Lord would not have spirituality divorced from 
common sense. 

Man is all outside to God. 

I always delight in a man who can afford to go about 
his life-work without fuss, bluster, or loud announcement. 

Usefulness is as possible in obscurity as in publicity. 

To wait is much wiser than, when you cannot hear the 
fog-horn and have no pilot, to steam on and wreck your 
vessel on the rocks. 

It is hell to live without a Saviour. 

Lose your head and you lose the battle. Lose your heart 
and you have lost all. 

In the struggle of life a cheerful fearlessness is a grand 
assistance. 

Though you have a clear head and can stand in a dan- 
gerous place, I would not recommend you to go there if 
somebody else would thus be placed in danger. 

Skillful mariners sail by all winds, and we ought to make 
progress through all circumstances. 

I saw the other day the emblem of a serpent with its 
tail in its mouth, and if I carry it a little beyond the artist's 
intention the symbol may set forth appetite swallowing up 
itself. 

Giving to God is no loss ; it is putting your substance 
into the best bank. 

Let us not seek to alter our destiny, but let us try to 
make the best of our circumstances. 

Is 



2 spurgeon's gold. 

While apostolic men looked for the coming of Christ, 
they looked for it with no idea of dread, but, on the con- 
trary, with the utmost joy. 

A notable divine once gave this direction: "The way 
to heaven is, turn to the right and keep straight on." I 
would add, turn when you come to the cross. Only one 
turn is needed, but that must be a thorough turn and one 
in which you persevere. 

God loves to discover even the shadow of faith in his 
unbelieving creatures. 

Sinners may go unpunished for many a bright hour of 
the morning of life, but as the day grows older the shadows 
fall and their way is clouded over. 

I believe that there is not a moral truth in the Book of 
Proverbs which does not also wear a spiritual aspect. 

The poorest way is better than none, and the humblest 
office is better than being out of employment. 

A very small graveyard will be big enough to bury all the 
good people who die through giving up their drop of beer. 

To go willfully into temptation is comparable to the crime 
of arson, in which a man collects combustible materials 
and secretly kindles them, that his house may be burned 
down. 

History certainly repeats itself within the Chuch of God 
as well as outside of it. 

Modern thought labors to get away from what is obvi- 
ously the meaning of the Holy Spirit, that sin was lifted 
from the guilty and laid upon the innocent. 

Our Lord's spirituality is not of that visionary sort which 
despises the feeding of hungry bodies. Look after His poor 
and needy ones. How can you be truly spiritual if you do 
not so? 

He who holds back a soul from Jesus is the servant of 
Satan, and is doing the most diabolical of all the devil's 
work. 

It is shameful and beyond endurance to see how genteel 
swindling is winked at by many. 



spurgeon's gold. 3 

» 

The power to receive is scarcely a power, and yet it is 
the only power needed for salvation. Come along and 
take what Christ doth freely give you. 

Suppose an accident should take away our lives ; I smile 
as I think that the worst thing that could happen would be 
the best thing that could happen. If we should die, we 
should but the sooner be u forever with the Lord." 

The publican's prayer so pleased the Lord Jesus Christ, 
who heard it, that He condescended to become a portrait 
painter, and took a sketch of the petitioner. 

Pain and depression of spirit, endured in early life, have 
prepared many to sympathize with the unhappy, and to 
live a life of benevolence. 

I will die with my face tow r ard God and holiness. 

If you are not saved it is not because God will not or 
cannot save you > it is because you refuse to accept His 
mercy in Christ. 

Your non-searching of the Scriptures, your weariness 
under Gospel preaching, your want of care to understand 
the mind of God, is prima facie evidence that there is some 
enmity in your heart against the Most High. 

If we live near to God we cannot sin without incurring 
sharp rebukes. 

There is no having influence over the great men or the 
little men of this age except by being firm in your prin- 
ciples and decided in what you do. If you yield an inch 
you are beaten ; but if you will not yield — no, not the 
splitting of a hair — they will respect you. 

Would to God that the best that could happen to all 
men did happen to them. 

The most careful driver one day upset the cart. 

We are soon coming out of the eggshell of time, and 
when we break loose into eternity and see the vastness of 
the divine purposes, we shall be altogether amazed at the 
service bestowed, which will be the reward of service done. 

Dogs will go mad with their muzzles on, and so will men 
sin despite the restraints of law. 



spurgeon's gold. 



Get a holy subject and keep to it till you have drawn some- 
what from it to feed your soul upon, and then you will do 
your life-work with less fatigue, because you will have more 
strength to spend upon it. 

Since evil thoughts are the first of sins, we had better 
meet the charge with immediate repentance and an instant 
faith in the only Saviour. 

A do-nothing professor is a merely nominal member, and 
a nominal member is a real hindrance. He neither con- 
tributes, nor prays, nor works, nor agonizes for souls, nor 
takes any part in Christian service, and yet he partakes in 
all the privileges of the Church. Is this fair ? 

Salvation is a diamond with many facets. 

If I begin to describe our hope, I must begin with what, 
I think, is always the topmast stone of it — the hope of the 
second advent of our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ ; for 
we believe that when He shall appear we shall also appear 
with Him in glory. 

When you and I get fearful how foolishly we think and 
speak and act. 

Our little ones are real beauties, always a pound or two 
plumper than others of their age, and yet it don't tire you 
half so much to nurse them as it does other people's babies. 

It is a very rare thing to hear even the infidel rail at the 
character of Jesus. 

If you are very busy, think and pray all the more, or 
your work will wear and weary you, and drag you away 
from God. For your work's sake, break away from it, and 
give the soul a breathing time. 

Believe in the Lord Jesus Christ, and believe intensely. 

The god of this world is the devil, and he claims implicit 
obedience. Sin in some form or other is the image which 
Satan sets up and requires us to serve. 

Language is thought to be forcible because it is hard, severe, 
and blustering, and yet there is little power in such speak- 
ing except to provoke opposition and furnish motives and 
weapons for the opposer. 



spurgeon's gold. 



To use an ecclesiastical term, we stand between two 
Epiphanies ; the first is the manifestation of the Son of 
God in human flesh in dishonor and weakness ; the second 
is the manifestation of the same Son of God in all His 
power and glory. 

Not even in this world does sin pay its servants good 
wages. 

If the way to God and salvation is, indeed, blocked up, 
it is only blocked up by your own sins. The door is not 
locked by a divine dercee, nor nailed up by any necessity 
of circumstances, nor barred by any peculiarity of your 
case. No, there is neither block, nor bar, nor lock, except 
your sin. 

You cannot in grace, any more than in anything else, do a 
great deal at once, and do it effectually. 

Faults are always thick where love is thin. 

Give me a man who deliberately makes up his mind, 
calmly sets to work, and patiently bears all rebuffs, and I 
know that what he sets himself to do will be done. 

Accept His rule, and He will except thy prayer. 

The service of God is a remunerative service ; He gives 
wages in the work, and an abundant reward, according to 
His grace, when the work is done. 

As voyagers cross the Atlantic, and so pass from shore to 
shore, so do we speed over the waves of this ever-changing 
world to the glory-land of the bright appearing of our 
Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ. 

We will measure our age from our second rather than our 
first birth. 

Baptism and the Lord's Supper will never be slighted by 
those whose hearts are fully possessed with love to Jesus. 
They may seem trifles, but if the Lord Jesus commands 
them they cannot be neglected. 

Some soldiers are good at a rush, but they cannot form a 
square and stand fast hour after hour. 

Jesus loves each one of His people with that same love 
wherewith He loves the whole of His people. 



spurgeon's gold. 



The following verses were written by Mr. Spurgeon at the 
age of eighteen : 

IMMANUEL. 

When once I mourned a load of sin ; 
When conscience felt a wound within ; 
When all my works were thrown away; 
When on my knees I knelt to pray, 

Then, blissful hour, remembered well — 

I learned thy love, Immanuel. 

When storms of sorrow toss my soul ; 
When waves of care around me roll ; 
W 7 hen comforts sink, when joys shall flee ; 
When hopeless griefs shall gape forme, 

One word the tempest's rage shall swell — 

That word thy name, Immanuel. 

When for the truth I suffer shame ; 
When foes pour scandal on my name; 
When cruel taunts and jeers abound ; 
When " Bulls of Bashan " gird me round, 

Secure within thy tower I'll dwell — 

That tower thy grace, Immanuel. 

When hell enraged lifts up her roar; 
When Satan stops my path before ; 
When fiends rejoice and wait my end ; 
When legion'd hosts their arrows send, 

Fear not, my soul, but hurl at hell 

Thy battle-cry, Immanuel. 

When down the hill of life I go ; 
When o'er my feet death's waters flow; 
When in the deep'ning flood I sink ; 
When friends stand weeping on the brink, 

I'll mingle with my last farewell 

Thy lovely name, Immanuel. 

When tears are banished from mine eye ; 
When fairer worlds than these are nigh ; 
When heaven shall fill my ravished sight; 
When I shall bathe in sweet delight, 

One joy all joys shall far excel — 

To see thy face, Immanuel. 

We ought to mind our thoughts, for if they turn to be 
our enemies they will be too many for us, and will drag us 
down to ruin. 

You will never get to Heaven, any of you, by playing at 
religion. 



spurgeon's gold, 



The world has come to call an unchaste woman "unfortu- 
nate," and this is but one open expression of what it secretly 
believes as to all sin ; it reckons our transgression to be our 
misfortune rather than our fault. 

Unless our profession is a lie we love each other, and 
we must therefore show that love by our prayers for one 
another. 

When two Christians met together who were sitting under 
a very lean and starving ministry, one of them comforted 
his fellow concerning the miserable discourse by saying : 
" Never mind, my friend, there is not much in the sermon, 
but the text is a feast by itself." 

Oh, yes, beloved, if we have faith we have hope. 

Though thy thirst be like that of a panting ox upon a 
sultry summer's day, who putteth down his mouth to the 
brook and drinks as though he would leave it dry, thou 
mayest come, and feel no trembling as to the sufficiency of 
the living waters. 

There are certain sheep-tracks up the slopes of Scripture 
which are much more trodden than the rest of the holy 
fields. 

Godliness and love can make a man, like a bird in a 
hedge, sing among thorns and briers, and set others a-sing- 
ing too. 

There is between real Christians a brotherhood which 
they will neither disown, nor dissemble, nor forget. 

Any simpleton might be set to sniff out offensive odors \ 
but it would require a scientific man to bring to us all the 
fragrant essences and rare perfumes which lie hid in field 
and garden. Oh, to learn the science of Christian charity ! 

This Bible is a letter from Him, and we prize it beyond 
the finest gold. 

Hope as much as ever a man can hope ) for when your 
hope is in God you cannot hope too much. 

Let us seek grace to become importunate pleaders of a 
sort that cannot be denied, since their faith overcomes 
heaven by prayer. 



8 SPURGEON S GOLD. 

Confession with the mouth is a sort of breaking away 
from the world. When a man says with his mouth, "I 
believe in the Lord Jesus Christ/' it is as good as saying to 
the world, " I have done with you." 

He is the devil's advocate who would judge the punish- 
ment of the impenitent to be a light one. 

We hear men crying, " Lo here ! " and "~Lo there!" 
This wonder and that marvel are cried up. It would seem 
that the age of miracles has returned to certain hot-heads. 
Take ye no heed of all this. False prophets will be left in 
the lurch, but the word of the Lord will stand. 

To keep debt, dirt, and the devil out of my cottage has 
been my greatest wish ever since I set up housekeeping. 

It is the quiet man, the meek man, who is always hard 
to be turned aside from his purpose. 

Some trades and callings are like a tropical climate, and 
their blackening effect is soon visible ; certain companies 
are still more so ; they make their mark upon the best of 
men, and that mark is not to their improvement. 

Repent of sin and fly from it earnestly and with your 
whole heart. 

Though we die in one sense, yet in another we shall not 
die, but live. We shall come forth from the land of the 
enemy in fullness of joy. 

Standing in one of the halls of the Orphanage is the very 
pulpit from which I savingly heard the Gospel of our Lord 
Jesus Christ. Though I have no reverence for relics of any 
sort, yet a flood of grateful memories flows before me as I 
look upon the platform whereon stood the unknown brother 
who pointed me to Jesus. 

He loves us better than we love ourselves. 

If there were anything yet to be revealed which would 
render your hope a delusion at the end, you should have 
been made acquainted with it ; Jesus Himself would break 
the sad news to you ; He would not leave you to be horri- 
fied by finding it out for yourselves. 

Don't throw away dirty water till you have got clean. 



spurgeon's gold, 



The men of this generation are even more greedy of 
gain, more in haste after their ambitions, than those that 
preceded them. They are fickle, exacting, hungering after 
excitement and sensation. 

We are told that the teaching of God's ministers must 
be conformed to the spirit of the age. We shall have noth- 
ing to do with such treason to truth. 

Men can with a few hasty words set loose a torrent of 
anger and uncharitableness, and cause the sweeping away 
of much good service and sweet fellowship, but who shall 
rule, restrain, or call back the raging flood. 

The heart of the Gospel is redemption. 

Sham sinners may be content with a sham Saviour ; but 
our Lord Jesus is the real Saviour, who did really die, and 
died for real sin. 

I believe that every flower in a garden, which is tended 
by a wise gardener, could tell of some particular care that • 
the gardener takes of it. He does for the dahlia what he 
does not for the sunflower ; somewhat is wanted by the rose 
that is not required by the lily ; and the geranium calls for 
an attention which is not given to the honey-suckle. Each 
flower wins from the gardener a special culture. 

The sorrow is sucked out of the sorrow by the lips of ac- 
quiescence. 

The only matter upon which we need consolation is that 
poor body, which once we loved so well, but which now 
we must leave in the cold clav. 

I have done my best to avoid dullness, and to aim at 
edification. 

After all, we get very few cuts of the whip, considering 
what bad cattle we are ; and when we do smart a little, it 
is soon over. 

Prayer is good, the habit of prayer is better, but the 
spirit of prayer is the best of all. 

All that is revealed concerning God is to me abundantly 
satisfactory; if I do not comprehend its full meaning, I 
bow before its mystery. 



10 spurgeon's gold. 

Every prudent merchant reckons upon a certain amount 
of bad debt and loss in his trading, and when it comes he 
writes it off as a part of his estimated charges, and is not 
broken-hearted. 

It is all nonsense to regard religion as a selfish spiritual 
trade by which we save our own souls. 

We can none of us tell if we go down to hell how many 
we shall draw with us, for we are bound to thousands by 
invisible bands. Over the tomb of each sinner may be 
read this epitaph : "This man perished not alone in his 
iniquity. ' ' 

Doubts are all driven away when you see how believers 
die. 

The process of spiritual quickening is not a matter of 
hours, but of a single second of time. I grant you, life 
would be very feeble at first; still, there must be a time in 
which it was not there at all; and, again, there must have 
been an instant in which it began. 

I believe in sanctified afflictions, but not in sanctifying 
afflictions. 

You will find debt to be a great dismal swamp, a huge 
mud-hole, a dirty ditch ; happy is the man who gets out of 
it after once tumbling in, but happiest of all is he who has 
been by God's goodness kept out of the mire altogether. 

Do not hope because you think yourselves pure, but 
•come to Jesus because you are impure and need to be 
cleansed by Him. 

It is a clear proof of the love of human nature to do evil 
that, when restrained from actual sin, men will rehearse 
their former exploits, and dote on the lusts which they in- 
dulged in years ago. 

Frequently it is foolish for us poor mortals to say, " I 
will," because our will is so feeble and fickle. 

If there were no poverty in London, it would be quite 
■enough to break one's heart to think that there is sin in it 
reigning over the ungodly. 

By no means put yourself in another person's power. 



spurgeon's gold. 11 

» 

We do not wear our best liveries, nor say enough of the 
joy of being in the Lord's service, nor speak enough of the 
wages which our Lord will pay at the end of the day. 

It is ever the singular glory of our Lord Jesus Christ that 
He continues to entreat, even when we continue to resist. 

The open confession of our faith has a good influence 
upon others. How could there be a Christian church at 
all if every Christian man concealed his faith in his own 
bosom ? If you love your Lord and have faith and hope 
in Him, do not delay to come forward and own his name 
and cause. 

Certain scriptural doctrines are, forsooth, discarded as 
•dogmas of the mediaeval period ; others are denounced as 
gloomy because they cannot be called untrue. 

It is not everybody that will remember to keep his gun- 
powder out of the way of the candle. 

We are refreshed by the companionship, sympathy, and 
advice of a like-minded comrade. 

What we can give to His cause we regard as children do 
their spending money; we lay it out with eagerness and 
wish it were a hundred times as much. 

Every self-righteous man is a selfish man. I am sure he 
is. 

The Lord rejoices to blot out the transgressions of repent- 
ing sinners, for He delighteth in mercy. 

If you can say that in no one action of your life, select 
what you may, was there anything blameworthy, anything 
that fell short, anything that could be censured, you say 
very much more than the best of men have ever claimed 
for themselves. 

He will make thee strong upon thy knees and mighty 
in holy service if thou wilt but surrender thy will to Him. 

I like to see the old man grow young when he talks of 
Christ ; let him on that point become enthusiastic, even as 
in his boyhood. 

Within the chosen family there are chastisements unknown 
to the outside world. 



12 spurgeon's gold. 

One sin might keep a man out of heaven ; but the multi- 
tudes of our iniquities, the blackness, the aggravation, the 
repetition of our offenses made the case hopeless to all 
human power of wisdom. 

Let us never contribute of our substance to the Master's 
cause with a grudging hand, as though a tax-gatherer were 
wringing from us what we could ill afford. 

We have seen those who dared not enter the devil's house 
linger long and lovingly around the door. The old woman 
in the fable, who could find no wine in the jar, yet loved to 
smell at it. 

Thoughts are the eggs of words and actions, and within 
the thoughts lie compacted and condensed all the villainy 
of actual transgressions. 

If you can say that you have served God and man with- 
out fault throughout all your days, you can say much more 
than I would venture to do. The Scripture also is dead 
against you when it says, "There is none righteous; no, 
not one." 

The less we have of self the more room there is for His 
divine grace. 

Many a man bears in his bones the sins of his youth. 
Around us are many who already wish that they had never 
been born, because of the condition into which their wan- 
tonness has brought them. 

If all the gathered-out company were to pray together, 
what a sound of supplication would go up by reason of the 
multitude of men. 

He who boasts of being perfect is perfect in folly. 

We look upon those as royal who can risk their lives for 
their fellow-men, to win them liberty or to teach them truth. 

A loose stone here, and a fallen tie there, and a rotting 
timber in a third place, will soon bring on a total ruin to a 
tenement, but the hand of diligence maintains the fabric. 
Thus must we watch our spiritual house, lest we fall by little 
and little. 



spurgeon's gold. 13 

» 

You have not taken God to be your God if you cannot 
be content with Him alone. 

I would sooner be blind, and deaf, and dumb, and lose 
all feeling than lose the sense of the beauty and perfection 
of God. 

No criminal can be hanged a second time ; one death is 
all the law requires ; believers died in Christ unto sin once, 
and now they penally die no more. Our condemnation 
has spent itself upon our Gracious Representative. 

Oh, that men would have wisdom enough not to undo in 
their old age what they have wrought in their youth ! 

Let a man get the light of God streaming into his soul, 
convincing him of sin, of righteousness, and of judgment 
to come and all reliance upon self in any form will seem 
to him to be the most hateful of crimes. 

We might be, and we ought to be, such men and women 
that those* who know us at home and in business would dis- 
cover us to be the friends of Jesus. 

What pins and needles tradesmen's bills must stick in a 
fellow's soul ! 

Many of us can bear testimony to-day that the word of 
the Lord is not word only, but power. It has done good 
to us. 

This is the fault of many lives : they are squandered 
upon a dozen objects, whereas if they were economized for 
one they would be mighty lives — known in the present and 
honored in the future. 

Ignorance is a wretched foundation, but sure knowledge 
is like a rock. 

This is our time of schooling and dicispline, and we are 
learning to obey, which is the highest and best lesson of all. 

Capacity for believing lies more in the child than in the 
man. We grow less rather than more capable of faith; 
every year finds the unregenerate mind farther away from 
God and makes it less capable of receiving the things of 
God. 



14 spurgeon's gold. 

God takes great delight in our crying to Him in the day 
of trouble, because there is sincerity in it. 

That exhortation, "Let us hold fast," might well be 
written on the cover of every Christian's Bible. We live 
in such a changeful age that we need all to be exhorted to 
be rooted and grounded, confirmed and established, in the 
truth. 

In the olden days there was a John Knox, whose prayers 
were more terrible to the adversary than whole armies, be- 
cause he pleaded in faith. 

There's always time enough to boast — wait a little longer. 

Inasmuch as that salvation of God is a great one, it must 
have been intended to meet great sins. 

It is well worth* while to shake off natural timidity, which 
would make a good man to be as though he were dumb 
and deprive him of half of his usefulness. To pray in 
private is essential, but to be able to pray in public is profit- 
able. 

Many men are worn to rottenness in the service of their 

lusts. 

He took our debts upon Him that He might pay them, 
minting his own heart to create the coinage. 

There is no way to heaven but by holiness. We have 
need to insist much upon this in these days ; for, together 
with laxity of thought and dubiousness of doctrinal teach- 
ing, there has come into vogue great looseness of morals. 

Thinking is living. 

Ah! if that question, "If ye love Me," needed to be 
raised in the sacred college of the twelve, much more must 
it be allowed to sift our churches and to test ourselves. 

Only let the Lord give me oil enough to feed my lamp, so 
that I may cast a ray across the dark and treacherous sea 
of life, and I am well content. 

Unkind and domineering husbands ought not to pretend 
to be Christians, for they act clean contrary to Christ's com- 
mands. 



spurgeon's gold. 15 

» 

Whatsoever men may think of our Lord as a teacher, 
candor demands that they admire his example and award it 
the highest meed of honor. 

The most fallacious estimates are made under the influence 
of corrupt desires. Like a judge that has been bribed, the 
understanding gives a false verdict. * 

As long as one Bible remains the empire of Satan is in 
danger. 

In proportion as a man grows in grace he feels his depend- 
ence upon God, and, in a certain sense, his dependence 
upon God's people. Lie decreases in his own esteem and 
his brethren increase in his estimation. 

In the dogmas of modern thought there is not enough 
mental meat to bait a mouse-trap ; as to food for a soul, there 
is none of it ; an ant would starve on such small grain. No 
atonement, no regeneration, no eternal love, no covenant; 
what is there worth thinking upon ? 

Worship is not acceptable if it be devoid of humility. 

A truth may sometimes amaze you because of its greatness, 
but that does not stagger your faith; for your faith deals 
with mysteries, and is familiar with sublimities which it 
never dreams of comprehending. 

It is well to recognize that sour speeches often proceed 
from a sad heart. It is wise to view ungenerous language 
as one of the symptoms of disease, and rather pity the 
sufferer than become irritated with the offensive speech. 

Economy is half the battle of life ; it is not so hard to 
earn money as to spend it well. 

Remember that we have no more faith at any time than 
we have in the hour of trial. 

God thinks no better of a tree for being burdened with 
rotten fruit, nor of a Church for being swollen in numbers- 
by base pretenders. 

I sicken as I think how man has plagued his fellow-men 
by his sins. 

This life is a preparatory school, and in it we are prepar- 
ing for the high engagements of the perfected. 



16 spurgeon's gold. 

Our Lord has a keen eye for all that is good. When He 
searches our hearts He never passes by the faintest longing, 
or desire, or faith, or love of any of His people. He says 
to each and all, " I know thy works." 

Godliness, like murder, will out. 

Love always d^ires to have its object near, and it has a 
faculty of bringing its object near. If you love anybody 
that person may be far away and yet to your thoughts he 
is close at hand. Love brings the beloved one so near that 
the thought of him acts upon its life. 

The best rubrics of worship are those which are written 
on broken hearts. 

Though sinful thoughts rise, they must not reign. 

Jesus speaks of "twelve legions." I suppose He men- 
tions the number twelve as a legion for each one of the 
eleven disciples and for Himself. They were only twelve, 
and yet the innumerable hosts of heaven would make forced 
marches for their rescue. 

A man fresh from a revival meeting looks like a zealous 
Christian ; but see him when he goes to market. As a face 
rendered red by the fire soon loses all its ruddiness, so do 
numbers lose all their godliness when they quit the society 
of the godly. 

The resurrection comes in as an undoing of all that death 
has done. 

It may be well to make laws to restrain fornication, theft, 
and blasphemy ; but the only sure cure for all sins is the 
grace of God in the heart. 

The master-magnet of the Gospel is not fear, but love. 
Penitents are drawn to Christ rather than driven. The 
most frequent impulse which leads men to Jesus is hope that 
in Him they may find salvation. Love wins the day. One 
hair from the head of love will draw more than the cable of 
fear. 

Purity should be the mother of prudence. 

Never be security for more than you are quite willing to 
lose. 



spurgeon's gold. 17 

» 

Jesus has redeemed not only our souls, but our bodies. 
" Know ye not that your bodies are the .temples of the Holy 
Ghost ? ' ' When the Lord shall deliver His captive people 
out of the land of the enemy He will not leave a bone of 
one of them in the adversary's power. 

It is a pleasure to us to think of our children, for they are 
parts of ourselves. We could almost as soon cease to be as 
cease to remember them. 

Oh, that the good Lord would make us correct in all 
points, lest we be propagators of sin through the influence 
of our faults. 

Come, then, to the meetings for prayer, for there is the 
strength of the Church, and there are her Samson's locks. 

I hate to hear a man exhibiting his old lusts as if they 
were scars of honor. 

It is shocking to find men and women speaking fluently 
about religion, and yet their houses are a disgrace to Chris- 
tianity. 

I hate heard people say : ' ' Just as I employ a lawyer to 
attend to my temporal business, and I do not bother my 
head any more about it, so I employ my priest or my clergy- 
man to attend to my spiritual business, and there is an end 
of it." This is evil talk, and ruinous to the man who in- 
dulges in it. 

Come, be not afraid to die, for you will travel a well- 
beaten track. 

In troublous times our best communion with God will 
be carried on by supplication. Tell Him thy case ; search 
out His promise, and then plead it with holy boldness. 
This is the best, the surest, the speediest way of relief. 

The spirit of rebellion is the same, whatever be the man- 
ner of displaying it. 

Do not be all sugar, or the world will suck you down ; 
but do not be all vinegar, or the world will spit you out. 

Lord, let me be among those who confess that they were 
once thine enemies, and have been reconciled to thee by 
the death of thy Son. 

2s 



18 spurgeon's gold. 

If we could read the secret history of dwarfed Christians 
we should find that they never had much humbling of heart. 

"Look unto Me and be ye saved all the ends of the 
earth/' was the voice of God to my soul. 

Pope said, "The proper study of mankind is man." It 
is a deplorably barren subject. Say, rather, "The proper 
study of mankind is God." 

When once we have passed through the iron gate and 
forded the dividing river, then we will begin to praise God 
in a manner more satisfactory than we can reach at present. 
After a nobler sort we will sing and adore. 

Sympathy with others is not learned without personal suf- 
fering. 

Since Jesus speaks after He has risen of the things that He 
said while He was with his disciples, we perceive that the 
river of death is not like the fabled Lethe, which caused all 
who drank thereof to forget their past. 

Lord, save me from sins which call themselves little. 

Patience is better than wisdom ; an ounce of patience is. 
worth a pound of brains. 

It was not Luther's arguments, but Luther's plain teach- 
ing of justification by faith which shook the corner-stone 
of the Vatican. 

The soul desires to leave the poor frail tenement of the 
body, but not that the body may be utterly destroyed ; it 
quits it with the hope of having the house of clay rebuilt in 
a more glorious form. 

Many roads lead to ruin, but only one to salvation. 

I believe in the perseverance of the saints because I 
believe in the perseverance of the love of God, or else I 
should not believe in it. 

When your dog loves you because it is dinner-time, you 
are not sure of him ; but when somebody else tempts him 
with a bone and he will not leave you, though just now 
you struck him, then you feel that he is truly attached to 
you. We may learn from dogs that true affection is not 
dependent upon what it is just now receiving. 



spurgeon's gold. 19 

» 

We know many persons who are always doing a great 
deal and yet do nothing — fussy people, people to the front 
in every movement, persons who could set the whole world 
right, but are not right themselves. Very eminent men are 
these ! 

Poverty on the back of bereavement is terrible. 

Lord, lead me to count nothing my treasure but thyself, 
and then I may defy the thief. 

A good appearance is a letter of recommendation, even 
to a plowman. 

Better far to be morbidly sensitive and condemn one's self 
needlessly than to be hardened through the deceitfulness of 
sin. 

Ah me, that so many who ought to be warriors are weak- 
lings ; that those who should be men of six feet high are 
so stunted as to be mere Tom Thumbs in grace. 

God will never alter His terms to please you. 

The most wonderful visit of all was when He came to 
tarry here, some thirty years and more, to work out our sal- 
vation. 

When a man so courageous, so patient, as Jesus betakes 
Himself to cries and tears, we may be sure that the sorrow 
of His heart has passed all bounds. His soul within Him 
must have been bursting with grief. We know it was so by 
another sign, for the life-blood forgot to course in its usual 
channels and overflowed its banks in a sweat of blood. 

The living child of God will have to swim against the 
stream. 

Let us work in the full conviction that our absent Lord 
will soon be here again with a glorious diadem upon His 
brow. 

Christ did not come to scare us from sin, but to save us 
from it. 

Pain past is pleasure, and experience comes by it. 

We do not believe in many ways to heaven, for we know 
that there is only one way. 



20 spurgeon's gold. 

I saw one stand up at the opening of this service to look 
around the Tabernacle, to see the multitude ; and well he 
might, for it is a thing to do one's eyes good to behold this 
vast assembly. But what shall be our joy when we shall 
stand up in the midst of the great company of the re- 
deemed? We shall look far and wide, and see no end of 
the great gathering. 

You cannot go round to a back-door, and enter heaven 
by stealth. 

It is better to mourn over imperfection that to be puffed 
up with the idle notion that there is no sin in you to be 
watched and conquered. 

Yonder father does not need anything of his child, and 
yet when his birthday comes round, and there are whisper-. 
erings over the house and little contributions that something 
may be given to dear father he is greatly pleased ; he is 
more charmed with the little one's trifling gift than with the 
gold he wins on the Exchange. 

New trials will bring new grace and prove the value of 
old promises. 

Discouragement is the national epidemic of our Israel. 

The evil of our life arises from the living evil within. 

The disciples of a patient Saviour should be patient 
themselves. 

Occasional actions and deeds done under pressure are no 
evidences of a man's condition one way or another. 

Often have I read books which have awakened in my 
soul a sense of true brotherhood with their authors, although 
I have known them to be of a church opposed to many or 
my own views. If they praise my divine Lord, if they 
speak of the inner life, and touch upon communion with 
God, and if they do this with that unction and living power 
which are the tokens of the Holy Spirit, then my heart 
cleaves to them, be they who they may. 

He is a fool, writ large, who knows not God. 

Can these things come together — mourning and resting? 
Oh, yes ! you and I know how they meet in one bosom. I 
never am so truly happy as when a sober sadness tinges my 
joy. 



SPURGEON S GOLD. 21 

When 'we get to heaven it will be, " Glory be to God 
for ever and ever and ever. ' ' We shall not hum even a 
single note to ourselves for our own glory or on account of 
any part of the work for which we deserved credit, but 
we shall ascribe the whole of our salvation to infinite love 
and undeserved favor, and to the unceasing faithfulness and 
power of our gracious covenant-keeping God. 

The keeping of every word of God is indispensable. 

Love makes no reckoning of odds. 

Companionship in evil leads to a high pitch of sin. 

Every man ought to have patience and pity for poverty. 

The prosperity which some welcome as an unmixed favor 
may far more rightly be regarded as an intense form of test. 

It is easy to learn how we all do it nowadays in our tem- 
ples — take off your hat, hold it in front of your face, and 
read the maker's name and address) then sit down, and at 
the proper moment bend forward and cover your eyes, and, 
furthermore, stand up when the rest of the congregation do 
so. People get to do this just as if they were wound up by 
machinery ; yet they do not pray when they are supposed 
to be praying, nor bow before the Lord when worship is 
being offered. 

Those whom the Lord honors in public he chastens in 
private. 

It is well that pain and anguish should cut the ropes 
which moor us to these earthly shores, that we may spread 
our sails for a voyage to the Better Land. 

I feel right glad to meet with a zealous man nowadays, 
for zeal for God has become a rare quality in the land. 
You see plenty of zeal where politics are concerned. Fash- 
ion and art and society and literature each one evokes zeal 
of a certain kind ; but we are not overdone with those who 
are zealous in the matter of religion. 

The love of Jesus is dispersed, but not divided. 

Let us learn from our Master to reckon upon forces in- 
visible. 



22 spurgeon's gold. 

It is more important to be prepared to live aright than 
to be in an ecstasy at the thought of death. 

A gentleman should have more in his pocket than on his 
back. 

We are all in within gunshot of the enemy as long as we 
are this side of Jordan. 

If I were to see a needle running across a table all by 
itself, I should know that under the table a magnet was at 
work out of sight. When I see a sinner running after 
Christ, I feel certain that divine love is drawing him ; the 
cords may be invisibe, but we are quite sure that they are 
there. 

Men set a high value on that which is difficult to procure. 

Though we should use the purest ceremonies, multiply 
the best of good works, and add thereto the costliest of 
gifts, yet we should be unable to make ourselves clean be- 
fore God. 

Here is a man that was lately a drunkard, and God has 
loved him and made him sober, and he is wonderfully proud 
because he is sober. What folly ! Have done, sir ! have 
done ! Give God the glory of your deliverance from the 
degrading vice, or else you are still degraded by ingratitude. 

By and by you and I will have to die, unless the Lord 
shoicld suddenly come. 

If the Spirit be with us, there will come multitudinous 
conversions. 

From a sweet fountain of thought we shall have sweet waters 
of talk. 

If some of the members at our meeting were a little more 
spry with their arms and legs when they are at labor, and a 
little quieter with their tongues, they would say more for 
our religion than they now do. 

Lord, let me think of Thee and Thy word all the while I 
am awake; and when I sleep, if I dream at all, let my 
imagination still tend Thy way. 

The least particle of diamond is diamond, and the least 
grain of truth is truth, and therefore to be prized above the 
rarest gems. 



spurgeon's gold. 23 

Obscure the cross and you have obscured all spiritual 
teaching. 

The most overpowering thought of all is that He loved 
us when there was nothing good in us whatever. 

The King's highway is made through the wilderness. 
This highway has conducted many already to God. It is 
said to be a "highway and a way; " it is not only a high- 
way by appointment, but it is a way by use and traffic. 

Faith that is not warranted by the Word of God is not 
faith, but folly. 

We never know what strength is till our own weakness 
drives us to trust omnipotence ; never understand how safe 
our refuge is till all other refuges fail us. 

He who is not godly every day is not godly any day. 

Let us plow the heaviest soil with our eye on the sheaves 
of harvest, and learn to sing at our labor while others mur- 
mur. 

Very small must be the number who have had fair weather 
all the way to glory. It is questionable if ever one has been 
so favored. 

The most of us are but feather-bed soldiers. Our ways 
are strewn with roses compared with those who endured 
hardness in the olden time. 

Difficulties imagined are apt to arrive. 

The Gospel which suits little children is that which saves 
souls ; the Gospel of the common people is the only Gospel. 

You would think from some people's talk that religion 
is a very difficult thing, only to be understood by the cult- 
ured few. You must be a learned scientist or a scholarly 
critic before you can understand the modern Gospel. It is 
not so with the Gospel of Jesus. Oftentimes learned men 
miss this way altogether, while simple people perceive it and 
walk in it. 

Let us watch that we never undo with our hands what we 
say with our tongues. 



24 spurgeon's gold. 

When we come to pleading terms with God, there is 
nothing that so helps us as to be able to quote the promise 
and plead, "Thou saidst." 

The egg of mischief is smaller than that of a midge ; a 
world of evil lurks in a drop of rebellion. 

He who plays when he should work has an evil spirit to 
be his playmate. 

Sermons which we have studied with care, delivered with 
travail, prayed over and wept over, are praised for such 
minor matters as taste, accuracy, and diction, and the truth 
they contain is not received. 

Oh, my heart, take care that thou answer to the Lord like 
an echo! When he saith, "My love," do thou answer 
with the selfsame title. 

Sin seems all the greater because it was committed against 
a sin-forgiving God. 

If he that has brought me so far toward heaven does not 
help me throughout the rest of my journey, I must die even 
within sight of the Promised Land. 

They used in the old times to catch pigeons and send them 
out with sweet unguents on their wings ; other pigeons fol- 
lowed them into the dovecote, for the sake of their perfume, 
and so were captured. I would that every one of us had 
the heavenly anointing on our wings, the divine perfumes 
of peace and joy and rest ; for then others would be fasci- 
nated to Jesus, allured to heaven. 

Let us value Scripture as much as Christ did. 

The presence of God does so stay the soul and quiet the 
heart that fear, which hath torment, is driven away. 

Into the army of our Lord the deserter is received with 
gladness ; but he must begin in the ranks, and must prove 
his fidelity before he is again entrusted with a commission. 

The best doctors are Dr. Diet, Dr. Quiet, and Dr. Merry- 
man. * 

A whole company of believers have been roused to hearty 
devotion by the fervor of one man. 



spurgeon's gold. 25 

Fellowship with God we must have, or the essential 
honey of love will be deficient, the bloom of joy will be 
wanting, the aroma of zeal and earnestness will be missed. 

We make fearful failures with God's promises through 
not appropriating them. 

Since the Lord has appeared to me, He has made me see 
His restraining hand where once I saw nothing but the 
cruel disappointment of my hopes. 

In my own person I know what it is to be vexed with 
sore pains and yet to feel such rest of heart that I felt no 
desire to complain. When we rejoice in divine love we 
make small account of our bodily condition. If deaf, 
blind, or otherwise full of infirmities of the flesh, we make 
small reckoning of the whole when we know the joy of 
pardoned sin. 

Those who are evermore making light of hell are prob- 
ably doing it in the hope of making it easy for themselves. 

We are bound to guard jealously every single word which 
He has given to us. 

Alas ! we do not always suffer fools gladly, though suffer 
them we do. 

Sooner than let their tongues have a holiday, men would 
complain that the grass is not a nice shade of green, and 
say that the sky would have looked neater if it had been 
whitewashed. 

Men throw away their souls in order to keep their 
coppers. 

Peter brought out brass farthings of boasting and impet- 
uous folly at times ; but he also brought forth so much true 
gold that his Lord said, " Blessed art thou, Simon Bar- 
jona." 

In the dust of self-abasement is the place for hope. 

When you and I are risen from the dead we shall rise 
full of the spirit of service. 

Charity towards others, abundantly practiced, would be 
the death of envy and the life of fellowship, the overthrow 
of self and the enthronement of grace. 



26 spurgeon's gold. 

A wise man has told us, as if it were an axiom, that the 
imputation or the non-imputation of sin is an impossibility. 
Be it so ; we have become familiar with such things since 
we have beheld the cross. Things which men call absurd- 
ities have become foundation truths to us. 

The arrears of neglected service are grim debts. 

Find, if you can, one occasion in which Jesus inculcated 
doubt, or bade men dwell in uncertainty. 

Of all matters, religion is the worst to play with. It 
may be easy to mimic it, but the price to be paid for such 
fooling will be terrible. 

Disobedient children are unhappy children. 

Alas ! the Lord himself had his Judas, and to this day 
swords of brittle metal hang at the golden girdle of his 
Church. 

The Lord's promise once given is never recalled. 

Thy work may be washed away like the work of little 
children in the sand of the sea-shore, but that which God 
doeth endureth forever. 

I have heard of a husband and wife who felt their love 
for each other to be so strong that they almost wished to 
go through the wedding ceremony again to show how 
content they were to bear the easy yoke of married love, 
Many of us could say the same. We would also be joined 
anew to our Lord. 

When you are in argument for the truth, do not grow 
angry, for this would be to fight the Lord's battles with the 
devil's weapons. 

The sermon is not long to you who feed upon the Word ; 
but to those who sleep at the table it is intolerably tedious. 
The whole service is dreary to them, though to believers it 
is bright and happy. 

The largest generosity must refuse some requests when it 
is a higher kindness to withhold than to bestow. 

If hearers were better, sermons would be better. 



spurgeon's gold. 27 

Death can hide in a drop and ride in a breath of air. 
Our greatest dangers lie hidden in little things. 

We care little for those who are orthodox Christians in 
creed if it is clear that they are heterodox in life. He who 
believes the truth should himself be true. 

We do not hold truth in a true way unless it leads us to 
a true life. 

But when God makes a promise He fulfills it, fulfills it, 
and fulfills it again and again and again, to the same man 
and to hundreds of other men. 

If you can say, "My God," you will be bound to exalt 
Him. If He has given Himself to you so that you can say, 
"My Beloved is mine," you will give yourself to Him, and 
you will add, "and I am His." Those two sentences, like 
two silken covers of a book, shut in within them the full 
score of the music of heaven. 

Many prosperous men owe their present position to the 
fact that they were faithful when they were in humble em- 
ployments. 

For brightness, give me not the sunlight, but that supe- 
rior glory with which the Lord lights up the darkness of 
affliction. 

One pampered sin will slay the soul as surely as one dose 
of poison will kill the body. 

Wise men in this world are like trees in a hedge— there is 
only here and there one. 

Verily, the race of fools has not yet died out. Thousands 
still think it profitable to gain the world and lose their 
own souls. 

Worldly-wise men think us fanatics and fools, but we 
know what they are and where the folly really lies. Oh, 
that their eyes were opened to join with us in the joys 
which they ridicule. 

The Lord Jesus Chrjgt has nothing that He values as He 
does His own people. 

While a man's first business is his body and the things of 
time and sense he is and must be at enmity with God. 



28 spurgeon's gold. 

It seemed almost a novelty in the church when it was 
stated, some years ago, that Mr. George Mliller walked by 
faith in regard to temporal things. To feed children by 
faith in God was looked upon as a pious freak. We have 
come to a pretty pass, have we not, when God is not to be 
trusted about common things? 

If you have great sin, remember that there is a great 
Saviour. 

We have to magnify our Lord among men who would, if 
they could, again crucify Him. 

We cannot too often use the weapon which the Spirit 
Himself calls His sword. 

The preacher claims no priestly power, and therefore 
should never wear a peculiar dress. 

If God bids us, we can sweeten water with salt and de- 
stroy poison with meat ; yea, we may walk the waves of the 
sea or the flames of a furnace. 

A true believer should tremble when the world commends 
him, but he should feel complimented when it utterly de- 
spises him. 

Evil thoughts mainly blacken the man's own mind. 

The world's catechism is, "What shall we eat? What 
shall we drink ? Wherewithal shall we be clothed ? ' ' 

As the young duck which has been reared in a dry place 
yet takes to the water as soon as it sees a pond, so do many 
hasten to evil at the first opportunity. How often it hap- 
pens that those young persons who have been most shut out 
from the world have become the readiest victims of tempta- 
tion when the time has come for them to quit the parental 
roof. 

Your tribulations will yet yield you music. 

Superstition and fanaticism shall not be gratified by either 
voice or dream, but yet the way of the righteous shall be 
made plain. 

We must teach more by our example than by our advice > 
or else we shall be poor pleaders for the right. 



spurgeon's gold. 29 

» 

Boldly come unto the King of kings, from whom no sin- 
cere petitioner ever was dismissed unheard. 

The poorest may be neat. 

We have had helpers after the flesh who have not been 
present when we wanted them — perhaps they have studi- 
ously kept out of the way ; at any rate, just at the pinch, 
when we have said, "Oh, that so-and-so were here," our 
friend has been at the end of the earth ; but it has never 
been so with God. 

I know no greater joy than to be useful to your souls. 

It is the part of a brave man, and especially of a believ- 
ing man, neither to dread death nor to sigh for it ; neither 
to fear it nor to court it. 

While dying, to turn one's eyes to Another dying at 
your side, and trust your soul with Him, is very marvelous 
faith. Blessed thief, because they put thee down at the 
bottom, as one of the least of saints, I think that I must 
bid thee come up higher and take one of the uppermost 
seats among those who by faith have glorified the Christ of 
God! 

It is the disciple's part to accept the teaching of his 
Master. 

Child-like confidence in God shall march on as upon a 
raised causeway, and always find for itself a road. 

The saint in his errors is a star under a cloud, but the 
sinner is darkness itself. 

Grumbling is a bad trade, and yields no profit. 

All that we see around us of force and might is but God 
in action. There is no such deity as "Nature /" nature 
is the Lord at work. 

A Caesar's revenue would discharge a poor man's liabili- 
ties and would scarcely suffer diminution ; far more will the 
infinite merits of Jesus discharge my sins and remain in- 
finitely full. 

We are outlaws, and His atonement purges us out of out- 
lawry and makes us citizens. 



30 spurgeon's gold. 

That your religion may be really solid metal, and not an 
imitation of it, or a mere gilded bauble, you must be tried. 

Whenever the Saviour describes Himself by any emblem 
that emblem is exalted and expanded, and yet it is not 
able to bear all his meaning. The Lord Jesus fills out every 
type, figure, and character; and when the vessel is filled 
there is an overflow. There is more in Jesus, the Good 
Shepherd, than you can pack away in a shepherd. He is 
the good, the great, the chief Shepherd; but He is much 
more. 

It is certain that more pleasure can be bought by money 
given to the poor and needy than by all the hoardings of 
a millionaire. 

I doubt not it shall be one of our greatest delights while 
seeing the Lord's face to serve Him with all our perfected 
powers. 

My soul, be thou in love with the way as well as with the 
end, since thy Lord is the one as well as the other. 

The ugliest sight in the world is one of those thorough- 
bred loafers. 

Self-denials, which seem hard at first, become delights 
in due season, so that we even wonder that we thought them 
denials. 

We all make too much of the approval or disapproval 
of our fellow-men, who are, after all, only the spectators, 
and not the umpires, of the race. 

We declare that among the most potent means in all the 
world is prayer. 

Mark well our singing. Do we join in it with the hearti- 
ness, the solemnity, and the correctness which are due to 
Him who hears our psalms and hymns? 

I spoke about the difficulty of keeping on. "Yes," 
answered my friend, "and it is harder still to keep on keep- 
ing on." So it is. There is the pinch. I know lots of 
fellows who are wonders at the start. What a rush they 
make ! But then there is no stay in them ; they soon lose 
breath. 



spurgeon's gold. 31 

Follow the Lord, for where the road is rough thou wilt be 
less likely to slip than in more smooth and slippery places. 

Our Lord, after he had risen from the dead, was still full 
of the spirit of service, and therefore he called others out 
to go and preach the Gospel, and he gave them the Spirit 
of God to help them. 

The agreement of two saints is a grand force, against 
which very few obstacles can stand. 

It is not how much we have, but how much we enjoy, 
that makes happiness. 

Most guilty men, when their crimes are exposed, blame 
their ill-luck and not their evil hearts. 

Some men treat the law and testimony of the Lord as if 
it were like plaster of Paris, to be poured over their features 
to take the cast of their own boasted loveliness. 

Sin is the gall of bitterness ; a drop of it would turn an 
ocean of pleasure into wormwood. 

It is difficult to realize it, that our divine and innocent 
Saviour placed Himself in such a condition for our sakes 
that His needs were manifold. 

What more treacherous than one's temper? In a sudden 
gust of passion you utter words of anger. How gladly 
would you recall them ! but they are registered. Down 
into the ditch of despondency you sink. For days to come 
you feel that you cannot forgive yourself. 

Your adversity may prove your advantage by offering 
occasion and opportunity for the display of divine grace. 

It is an essential part of the education of a Christian to 
learn the promises. 

Certain minds will learn anything from those they love 
and nothing from those who are masterful with them. 

There is wisdom in generosity. 

We ought as naturally to seek after the Lord from day 
to day as the spark seeks the sun, or the river the ocean, 
or the sheep its pasture, or the bird its nest. 



32 spurgeon's gold. 

We have had enough to do with watching over our own 
hearts and endeavoring to bring sinners to Christ without 
becoming more nice than wise upon matters of theological 
subtlety and word-spinning. 

Truth may not prevail to-day or to-morrow, but her ulti- 
mate victory is sure. 

I have found by long experience that nothing touches 
the heart like the cross of Christ. 

We ought to have an intense longing for the salvation of 
all sorts of men, and especially for those, if there are any, 
that treat us badly. We should never wish them ill, not 
for a moment ; but in proportion to their malice should' be 
our intense desire for their good. 

Men make engagements thoughtlessly, and before long 
they realize that it would be ruinous to keep them. 

I had no fault to find with him except this- grave fault — 
that he was seldom at home, was not master of the house, 
and could not control his children. 

If I were to choose a trade I would select one which gave 
me leisure for the service of the Lord Jesus. 

Silence seldom makes mischief. 

He who is discovered by his real excellence and not by 
his egotistical advertisement of his own perfections is a man 
worth knowing. 

Satan knows that we would never consent to give up a 
wheel of the Gospel chariot, and therefore in his craftiness 
he only asks for the linch-pins to be handed over to him. 

The heart of man is the seed-plot of iniquity and the 
nursery of transgression. 

When grace is absent there is no meaning in ritual ; it 
is as senseless as an idiot's game. 

The Greek Liturgy fitly speaks of " Thine unknown suffer- 
ings;" probably to us they are unknowable sufferings. He 
was God as well as man, and the Godhead lent an omnipo- 
tent power to the manhood, so that there was compressed 
within His soul and endured by it an amount of anguish 
of which we can form no conception. 



spurgeon's gold. 33 

Those that fight against the Lord of Hosts are not agreed 
among themselves ; they shall sheathe their swords in each 
other's bosoms. 

Prayer is an ever open door. 

Sinners run fearful risks when they appeal to justice ; their 
wisdom is to cast themselves upon free grace. 

If they were not fools they would not be idlers. 

Never say, "Nobody will see me," for you will see your- 
self, and your conscience will turn king's evidence against 
you. 

We must capture hearts for Jesus by showing that we are 
of like passions with them, and love them much. Love 
men to Jesus — that is the. art of soul-winning. 

God can bless our littleness and use it for His glory. 

Persons of sensitive disposition and sedentary habits are 
prone to seek a righteousness of inward feeling. 

There will be no climbing the hill of the Lord without 
effort ; no going to glory without the violence of faith. I 
believe that the ascent to heaven is still as Bunyan described 
it — a staircase, every step of which will have to be fought 
for. 

It is not easy to avoid injuring others. 

An infinite serenity shall keep our body, soul, and spirit 
throughout eternity. 

A sentinel must not leave his post even to gather pearls 
or diamonds ; nor must we forsake our duty in order to 
acquire the highest honors. 

If we never have headaches through rebuking our little 
children, we shall have plenty of heartaches when they 
grow up. 

It is a mere assumption, though some state it with much 
confidence, that inability removes responsibility. 

Wheels are tapped with a hammer on the railway that 
their soundness may be tested. Not only does affliction 
thus try our characters, but prosperity does the same. 

3s 



34 spurgeon's gold. 

The real cure for covetousness — namely, contentment. 
This is a rare drug in the market. 

Unbelief calls you to go from improbability to impossi- 
bility; from extravagance to romance; from romance to 
raving. 

Our dear babes go home because iC He gathereth the lambs 
with His arms and carrieth them in his bosom ; ' ' and our 
ripe saints go home because the Beloved is come into His 
garden to gather lilies. These words of our Lord Jesus 
explain the continual home-going ; they are the answer to the 
riddle which we call death. 

The Lord has a faithful company that hold fast the faith 
and will not let it go. 

Satan is always doing his utmost to stay the work of God. 

A fallen one, when restored, may have gained in self- 
knowledge, but he must necessarily be a loser in many 
other respects. 

All heads are not sense-boxes. 

Delayed answers are not only trials of faith, but they give 
us an opportunity of honoring God by our steadfast confi- 
dence in Him under apparent repulses. 

It is true the Church is not so full of life and energy and 
power and spirituality and holiness as she was in her first 
days, and therefore some insinuate that the Gospel is an 
antique and effete thing ; in other words, that the Spirit of 
God is not so mighty as in past ages. Instead of blaming 
the Holy Ghost, would it not be better for us to smite 
upon our breasts and chasten our hearts ? 

If we follow not the way of distinction from the world 
we are not following Christ. 

It shall be well for any minister if it may be written upon 
his tombstone, "He never preached what he did not 
practice." 

Know that verily you are a piece of gold, or else you 
would not have been put into the furnace. 

Idle men tempt the devil to tempt them. 



spurgeon's gold. 35 

The child has to go to bed, but it does not cry if mother 
is going upstairs with it. It is quite dark; but what of 
that ? The mother's eyes are lamps to the child. It is very 
lonely and still. Not so \ the mother's arms are the child's 
company and her voice is its music. 

The choicest communications ever made to human minds 
are those which have come from the Great Father. 

Certain herbs yield no smell till they are trodden on, and 
certain characters do not reveal their excellence till they 
are tried. 

Wealth to the worldling is not wealth to the Christian. 
His currency is different, his valuables are of another sort. 

A church is a congregation of faithful men — that is to 
say, of men who are believers in the Lord Jesus, men in 
whom the Holy Spirit has created faith in Christ, and the 
new nature of which faith is the sure index. The one 
Church of Jesus Christ is made up of all believers through- 
out all time. Just as any one church is made up of faithful 
men, so is the one Church of Christ made up of all faithful 
churches in all lands, and of all faithful men in all ages. 

Hold the old faith, and hold it in the old fashion, too. 

God has not merely pitied us from a distance and sent us 
relief by way of the ladder which Jacob saw, but He hath 
Himself visited us. 

Do you not know that a person who is silent when a wrong 
thing is said or done may become a participator in the sin ? 
If you do not rebuke sin — I mean, of course, on all fit oc- 
casions, and in a proper spirit — your silence will give consent 
to the sin, and you will be an aider and abettor in it. 

Only when you are out-and-out for Jesus can you be in a 
right condition. 

The possession of a God or the non-possession of a God 
makes the greatest possible difference between man and man. 

Cannon have been called " the last arguments of kings ; ' ' 
but the name of Jesus is the master argument of the King's 
children. 



36 spurgeon's gold. 

Neither the wise nor the wealthy can help him who has 
long refused to help himself. 

Any one sin willfully indulged and persevered in is quite 
sufficient to prove a man to be a traitor to his God. 

The Church is not formed to be a social club, to pro- 
duce society for itself; not to be a political association, to 
be a power in politics ; nor even to be a religious confed- 
eracy, promoting its own opinions ; it is a body created of 
the Lord to answer his own ends and purposes, and it exists 
for nothing else. 

If there were no heaven to miss and no hell to merit, sin 
is a curse upon this life. How differently would some of 
you hear if you did but remember that in the Gospel God 
Himself in person comes to you ! 

The labor of the foolish in spinning a righteousness of 
their own, that is neither accredited by the divine law nor 
by the holy Gospel, is almost incredible; they would rather 
give their bodies to be burned and their goods to feed the 
poor than submit to salvation by grace, though it is the 
only possible salvation. 

The difficulties of unbelief are ten times greater than the 
difficulties of faith. 

He that speaks truly will not run back from his promise . 

That religion which needs no care and takes no trouble 
is in great demand in the world. 

Idleness is the key of beggary. 

Who, then, are they that laugh at faith? Rationalists? 
Nay ; irrational men, at war with one of nature's first and 
most essential laws. 

Surely the good Lord means to convince the Church of 
her own powerlessness that she may cast herself upon the 
divine might. Looking around she can see no help for her 
in her enterprise ; let her look up and watch for His coming 
who will bring her deliverance. Amid apparent helpless- 
ness the Church is rich in secret succors. When the time 
cometh for the Lord to make bare His arm, we shall see 
greater things than these, and then we shall wrap our faces 
in a veil of blushing confusion to think that we ever doubted 
the Most High. 



spurgeon's gold. 37 

» 
The sin of doing nothing is about the biggest of all sins, 
for it involves most of the others. 

Every day I say to myself: 

" What though my eye of faith be dim, 
I'll hold on Jesus, sink or swim." 

It is written, " The blood of Jesus Christ His Son cleans- 
eth us from all sin." I have often heard the text quoted 
with the "us " left out ; permit me to put it in at this mo- 
ment — "cleanseth us from all sin." Now, put yourself 
into the "us." Dare to believe that grace admits you 
there. 

He is making his own damnation sure if he is robbing 
his creditors and yet professing to be a Christian. 

I fear you have more ability than you will give an ac- 
count of with joy at the last great day. 

Lord, I had rather take the worst from Thee than the 
best from Thine enemy. 

Somewhere or other in the worst flood of trouble there 
always is a dry spot for contentment to get its foot on, and 
if there were not it would learn to swim. 

My soul, thou canst not know or understand all things, 
else wert thou omniscient, and that is the prerogative of 
God alone. 

I am persuaded that if any Church desires to be much 
honored of the Lord in these days, both as to internal hap- 
piness and external usefulness, it will find that the nearest 
way to its desire is to be wholly consecrated to the Lord. 

Live in such a way that any day would make a suitable 
topstone for life. 

Sin is like a ladder. Few reach the height of iniquity 
at once ; the most of men climb from one evil to another, 
and then to a third and a fourth. 

The harlot — she strays into the house of God and feels 
that she has no right to be there, and yet the day comes 
when she stands behind the Master washing His feet with 
her tears and wiping them with the hairs of her head, be- 
cause she has had much forgiven. 



38 spurgeon's gold. 

Men do not pray and supplicate unless they have greater 
need than this world can satisfy. 

I do not find it necessary, when I talk with the bereaved, 
to comfort them at all concerning those that are asleep in 
Christ as to their souls. We know that they are forever with 
the Lord and are supremely blessed and therefore we need 
need no further comfort. 

A mind stuffed with vanity and unbelief must be worse 
than clothes stuffed with straw. 

No flies will go down your throat if you keep your mouth 
shut, and no evil speaking will come up. 

Since the way to heaven is heavenly and the road to bliss 
is bliss, who will not become a pilgrim ? 

Our own experience leads us to the conclusion that critics 
of others and noisy talkers of all kinds have usually some 
design of their own and are working to their own hand. 

We had better quit our professions if we do not live up to 
them ! 

Emblems to set Him forth may be multiplied as the drops 
of the morning, but the whole multitude will fail to reflect 
all His brightness. 

It may be that we shall not die ; our Lord Jesus may come 
before we fall asleep ; but if he do not come speedily, we 
shall find that it is appointed unto all men once to die. W T e 
shall pass from this world unto the Father by that common 
road which is beaten hard by the innumerable feet of mortal 
men. 

You have gone, perhaps, to the extreme of sin ; He has 
gone to the extreme of atonement. 

a Am I an earnest laborer together with God, or am I, 
after all, only a laborious trifler, an industrious doer of 
nothing, working hard to accomplish no purpose of the sort 
for which I ought to work, since I ought to live unto my 
Lord alone." 

A little sin unrepented of will be as fatal as a gross trans- 
gression. 



spurgeon's gold. 39 

Many see more with one eye than others with two, and 
many have fine eyes and cannot see a jot. 

Praise finds out the crack of pride, wealth reveals the flaw 
of selfishness, and learning discovers the leak of unbelief. 

Lord, be pleased of thy great mercy to overrule the vast 
amount of poverty and suffering which is now in this land, 
that men may be driven to Thee thereby. 

Make sure of your footing when you stand ; make double 
sure of it before you shift. 

It is a sin not to rejoice. I will not say it harshly ; I should 
like to say it as softly and tenderly as it could be put. 

The last new book, perhaps the last sentimental story, 
will win attentive reading, when the divine, mysterious, 
unutterable depths of heavenly knowledge are disregarded 
by us. Alas, my brethren, too many eat the unripe fruit of 
the vineyards of Satan, and the fruits of the Lord's vines 
they utterly despise ! 

Between us and heaven once lay the tremendous Alps of 
sin. 

" Oh," you say, "if I were to begin I should not keep 
on." No; if you began perhaps you would not; but if 
He begins with you He will keep on. 

Foul is fair to me if the Lord appoints it in love. 

Laziness is in some people's bones and will show itself in 
their idle flesh, do what you will with them. 

The developing power of tribulation is very great : faith, 
patience, resignation, endurance, and steadfastness are by 
far the best seen when put to the test by adversity, pain, 
and temptation. 

With my Lord before me, I am a traitor to him if I chink 
the pieces of silver in my hand and accept a present satis- 
faction in barter for higher things. 

Experience teaches. This is the real High School for 
God's children. 

Wagon-loads of sermons have been lost upon you — will 
you now believe on Him ? 



40 spurgeon's gold. 

You sometimes see a railway carriage or truck fastened 
onto what goes before, but there is also a great hook be- 
hind. What is that for ? Why, to fasten something else 
behind, and so to lengthen the train. Any one mercy from 
God is linked onto all the mercy that went before it, but 
provision is also made for adding future blessings. 

An honest heart and an honest hand must be found in 
every man who is to be justified at the last great day. 

The learned at this hour scoff at the Book, and accuse of 
bibliolatry those of us who reverence the divine Word, but 
in this they derive no assistance from the teaching or ex- 
ample of Jesus. 

When the devil's work seems good it is at its worst. 

Many people are born crying, live complaining, and die 
disappointed. 

A scare is not a conversion. A sinner may be frightened 
into hypocrisy, but he must be wooed to repentance and 
faith. 

"I sought the Lord, and he heard me," is better argu- 
ment than all the Butler's Analogies that will ever be writ- 
ten, good as they are in their place. 

Silence is often more emphatic than speech. 

I do not want to have any of you remaining in spiritual 
infancy ; we long to see you come to the fullness of the 
stature of perfect men in Christ Jesus. 

Your reward is not what you get at present, but it lies in 
the glorious future. When the Lord Jesus comes He will 
reward all His stewards and servants. No truth is more 
plain in the four Gospels than this fact, that when Jesus re- 
turns to this earth He will distribute recompense in propor- 
tion to work done. 

A Christian's business ought to be the best done of any 
man's in the world. 

Supposed friends have left us, even as the swallows quit 
in our wintry weather ; but we are not alone, for the Father 
is with us. 



spurgeon's gold. 41 

» 

We have known persons of small talent and position in- 
fluence their superiors by their zeal. 

All are not working men who call themselves so. 

Our pastoral observation over a very large church has 
led us to expect to see terrible failures among those who 
carry their heads high among their brethren. 

To rise in His resurrection, to live because he lives, to be 
crowned in His coronation, and to be glorified with His 
glory, this is a double — yea, a sevenfold bliss. 

Heaven and all its joys are to be had upon believing. 

Even if sin be speedily repented of, its damage is not 
readily repaired ; if its writing be erased you can see where 
it used to be. 

It is a wretched business for a man to call himself a Christ- 
ian, and have a soul which never peeps oitt from between 
his own ribs. It is horrible to be living to be saved, living 
to get to Heaven, living to enjoy religion, and yet never to 
live to bless others and ease the misery of a moaning 
world. 

Breathe the air, and the air is yours ; receive Christ, and 
Christ is yours. 

Every one in Christ, man or woman, hath some testimony 
to bear, some warning to give, some deed to do in the name 
of the holy child Jesus. 

O Lord, save me from all deceit and, above all, prevent 
my deceiving myself. 

An ounce of health is worth a sack of diamonds. 

If the watcher forsakes his post it will not avail that he 
climbed a mountain or swam a river ; he was not where he 
was ordered to be. 

The limit which is set to prayer — namely, that if we ask 
anything in accordance with God' 's will he heareth us, is 
iust such a limit as love on God's part must fix, and as pru- 
dence on our part must approve. 

That blessed Book is a love-letter from God, the great 
Father. 



42 spurgeon's gold. 

The imperfections of the perfect are generally more glar- 
ing than those of ordinary believers. 

It is said of the peasants around Nice that they seem to 
have no thought of anything but how they can make a liv- 
ing and save a little money, and I am afraid they are by no 
means a singular people ; in some form or other the world 
is in all men's hearts and thoughts. The dust of earth has 
blinded eyes that were meant for heaven. 

Malice is seldom specific in its charges. 

There is an old proverb which says of So-and-so that he 
was " as sound asleep as a church." I suppose there is 
nothing that can sleep so soundly as a church. 

Lord, bit and bridle me, I pray Thee, and never let me 
break loose from Thy divine control. 

Let us, then, be careful that we do not hurt our neighbor 
in so tender a point as his character, for it is hard to get 
dirt off if it is once thrown on. 

Lord, thy logos is my logic; thy Testament is my 
argument; thy Word is my warrant. 

We see around us those who are much hindered in holy 
living by the fact of their being wealthy, and yet perhaps 
we are pining to run in their silken sack. 

We are so dull and carnal that our affections are soon 
captured by earthly objects. 

When we think of God's delight in us and His love to 
us, is it not shameful that we should have been so seldom 
engaged in devotion toward Him. 

Sin is carried away into the silent land, the unknown 
wilderness. By nature sin is everywhere, but to believers 
in the sacrifice of Christ sin is nowhere. The sins of God's 
people have gone beyond recall. Where to? Do not ask 
anything about that. If they were sought for, they could 
not be found; they are so gone that they are blotted out. 

1 do implore men to give up every kind of public work 
till they have first done their work at home. 

It is not ours to improve the Gospel, but to repeat it when 
we preach, and obey it when we hear. 



spurgeon's gold. 43 

> 

The missionary spirit is the spirit of Christ — not only 
the spirit of Him that died to save, but the spirit of Him 
who has finished His work, and has gone into His rest. Let 
us cultivate that spirit, if we would be like the Jesus who has 
risen from the dead. 

With children you must mix gentleness with firmness; 
they must not always have their own way, but they must 
not always be thwarted. 

Like thy servant David, I would hate every false way. 

Because we make appointments for ourselves and forget 
the appointments of God, we meet with many more disap- 
pointments than would otherwise fall to our lot. 

If there were no hell hereafter, it would be hell enough 
to me not to enjoy everlasting love. 

As it is idle with day-dreams to fascinate the heart into 
a groundless expectation, so it is equally foolish to increase 
the evil of them by forebodings of to-morrow. 

He that rejoices in the Lord always will be a great encour- 
agement to his fellow-Christians. He comes into the room ; 
you like the very look of his face. It is a half holiday to 
look at him; and as soon as ever he speaks he drops a 
sweet word of encouragement £or the weak and afflicted. 

The spirit of the age is the spirit of proud self-sufficiency. 

Many a time it has cost honest minds great grief to feel 
that, though they are willing enough to do what they have 
engaged to do, yet they have lost their ability to perform 
their word. 

If we seek a temptation we shall soon find it ; and within 
it, like a kernel in a nut, we shall meet with sin. 

Grin and bear it is the old-fashioned advice, but sing 
and bear it is a great deal better. 

It is a matter of fact that, by smarting for one fault, 
gracious men learn to avoid others. 

When a sincere believer tells of his own experience of 
the Lord's faithfulness it has a great charm about it. We 
like to hear the narrative of a journey from the traveler him- 
self. 



44 spurgeon's gold. 

We sometimes judge the condition of religion too len- 
iently, or else we err on the other side, and judge too 
severely. 

Godliness is a life-long business. 

I am glad to hope that some men are converted to God 
amid war and earthquakes and pestilence \ but I am inclined 
to be suspicious of that kind of conversion, for fear it should 
die with its cause. 

Many men are fondly persuaded that either they need no 
saving or that they can save themselves. 

If men become obedient by compulsion, but would dis- 
obey if they dared, then their hearts are not right before 
God, and their actions are of little worth. 

My very soul boils within me when I think of the impu- 
dent arrogance of certain willful spirits from whom all rev- 
erence for revelation has departed. 

Commit all your secrets to no man. 

When faith is broad and large, love knows that all mat- 
ters which grieve the minds of His servants touch the heart 
of the Master, and that all which works our good works 
also his delight. 

Trust in the Lord and use medicine too ; but of the two 
evils — faith in God and no use of means, or use of means 
and no faith in God — we should certainly prefer the former. 

Sin is the great plague and pest of our lives. 

Sin is a contradictory thing which blows hot and cold ; 
it hurries men, like fitful winds, this way and that, yet never 
in the right direction. 

When a door has to be shut to save life, there is no use 
in half shutting it. If a person may be killed by going 
through it, you had better board it up, or brick it up. I 
want to brick up the dangerous opening of self-confidence, 
for it leads to deception, disappointment, and despair. 

Obedience must have love for its mother, nurse, and food. 
The essence of obedience lies in the hearty love which 
prompts the deed rather than in the deed itself. 



spurgeon's gold. 45 

You may even go so far as to court persecution from self- 
ish motives. 

He who found a Moses to face Pharaoh, an Elijah to 
face Jezebel, can find a man to confront the adversaries of 
to-day. 

But some will say that they cannot help having bad 
thoughts; that may be, but the question is, Do they hate 
them or not? 

In religion everything artificial is ridiculous, or worse ; 
but grace in the heart is the best ' ' master of the ceremonies. ' ' 

He has a golden master-key which excels all others : it 
is the operation of His own most gracious Spirit by which 
entrance is effected into hearts which seemed shut up forever. 

Live diligently. Live while you live. 

Men work for what they can get by working and pray 
for that which can by no other means be obtained. 

When a man is easily reminded of a thing it shows that 
it is agreeable to him to think of it. We are sure that God's 
heart is much wrapped up in the covenant of grace, since 
the feeble cries of His children remind Him of it. 

Do not reckon to live unnoticed, for a fierce light beats 
about every Christian. 

Christianity does not come into a nation to break up its 
arrangements or to break down its fabric. All that is good 
in human society it preserves and establishes. 

Some people make a great deal of common sense, and 
well they may, for it is the most uncommon of all the senses. 

Why, at home you are at home, and what more do you 
want? Nobody grudges you, whatever your appetite may 
be, and you don't get put into a damp bed. 

Can a man command the Lord ? Yes, to believing men 
He puts Himself at their call. 

It is a pity that some men carry their heads so high above 
their fellows all the day, for they will have to sleep at night 
in the same bed of clay with those whom they despise. 

Anything that hurts the home is a curse. 



46 spurgeon's gold. 

There must be a present conscious enjoyable pardon of 
sin, else there would be no joy in the world for thoughtful 
minds. 

I always feel a suspicion of those converts who get up and 
glibly boast that once they were drunkards, thieves, blas- 
phemers, and so forth. Brother, if you do tell the story ot 
your sin, blush scarlet to think it should be true. 

Oh happy man, to know" no scepticism, but heroically to 
believe ! 

There are many ungodly people still in the world who are 
not happy in the condition in which they find themselves. 
The present does not content them, and they have no future 
from which to borrow the light of hope. 

I have heard talk of "a larger hope" than the Gospel 
sets before us; it is a fable, with nothing in Scripture to 
warrant it. 

To keep out vain thoughts, it is wise and prudent to have 
the mind stored with choice subjects for meditation. 

There is something nobler in falling by the woodman's 
strokes than in perishing by a little worm at the root. The 
meanness of decaying into corruption while standing in the 
midst of a Church is awful. 

He who is a moral monster was not always such. By 
sinning much he learned to sin more. 

Do not wish to have your portion in this life, lest you get 
it ; for then you will be as the ungodly. 

66 Be sober" And does not that mean, first, moderation 
in all things? Do not be so excited with joy as to become 
childish. Do not grow intoxicated and delirious with 
worldly gain or honor. On the other hand, do not be too 
much depressed with passing troubles. 

To the righteous man death is not now a penalty, but a 
mode of going home. 

He is a very good Christian man in his own esteem, but 
he also knows a good glass of wine, and is most fluent when 
he is getting far into the bottle. Have drunkards any hope 
of eternal life ? 



spurgeon's gold. 47 

It seems as if the devil had muzzled some of you, so 
that you dare not take the good things of the Gospel to 
yourselves. 

From henceforth let no man trouble me with doubts and 
questionings ; I bear in my scul the proofs of the Spirit's 
truth and power, and I will have none of your artful reason- 
ings. 

If all poor men's wives knew how to cook, how far a 
little might go. 

Sinners hate each other while they wander in their dif- 
ferent ways ; but when the Lord brings them together by 
His grace, then love is born in their hearts. 

What is the daffodil without its golden crown, or the 
crocus without its cup of sunshine ? Such is man without 
the object of his life. 

It is the rule with the truly great to think most highly 
of others. 

When the decree of God is our delight, we feel no ab- 
horrence to anything which he appoints, either in life or in 
death. 

A mouse was caught in a trap, the other day, by its tail,. 
and the poor creature went on eating the cheese. Many 
men are doing the same ; they know that they are guilty 
and they dread their punishment, but they go on nibbling 
at their beloved sins. 

His home-going pledges Him to come and compels us to 
look for Him. 

It is not the performance of pompous ceremonies, it is 
not bowing and scraping, it is not using sacred words, but 
it is crying to God in the hour of your trouble which is the 
most acceptable sacrifice your spirit can bring before the 
throne of God. 

A boaster and a liar are first cousins. 

Though cruel men may desire thine ill and devise mis- 
chief against thee, thou art safe enough until the Lord shall 
be pleased to let loose the lion, and even then thou shalt 
suffer no permanent injury. 



48 spurgeon's gold. 

I find in the story of the brave days of old the same con- 
fessions and the same lamentations which we utter now. 

Out of a dove's nest we expect only doves to fly. The 
heavenly life breeds birds of paradise, such as holy thoughts, 
desires, and acts ; and it cannot bring forth such unclean 
birds as lust, and envy, and malice. 

God suffers no foes to trespass on the domain of Provi- 
dence. 

If you mean to dare the infernal terrors, I can do no less 
than ask you to know what you are at. 

When the Holy Spirit comes into the heart He finds 
that we know so much already of what it were well to leave 
unknown ; we are self-conceited, we are puffed up. We 
have learned lessons of worldly wisdom and carnal policy, 
and these we need to unlearn and deny. 

Our wonderful variety of wants is met by His wonderful 
variety of excellences. 

Make thou good use of thy God, and especially gain the 
fullest advantage from Him by pleading with Him in prayer. 

Nothing profits a man which is done carelessly. 

When a man is proud as a peacock — all strut and show — 
he needs converting himself before he sets up to preach to 
others. 

It is of no use reckoning that every egg in our basket 
will become a chicken, for it will not so happen, and our 
over-anticipation will be the cause of needless sorrow to us. 

It is of the nature of the Lord's people to assemble them- 
selves together and live in companies. Wild beasts may 
roam the woods alone, but sheep go in flocks. 

Selfishness is never worse than when it puts on the garb 
of religion. 

He who keeps the crown of the causeway, though he 
may hear the lion roar, shall not meet it in the way. No 
ravenous beasts shall be found there, for the way is not to 
their mind. There is one lion which those who make Jesus 
their way need never be afraid of — that is the lion of un- 
pardoned sin. 



spurgeon's gold. 49 

Christian people are doing to-day what their forefathers 
would have loathed. Multitudes of professors are but very 
little different from worldlings. 

There is always something to hoped for in the Christian's 
life. 

We sigh for men cultured and trained in all the knowledge 
of the heathen \ nay, but if we sought more for unction, 
for divine authority, and for that power which doth hedge 
about the man of God, how much wiser should we be. 

Sinners take more pains to go to hell than the saints to 
go to heaven. 

I never yet saw a minister worth his salt who had not some 
crotchet or oddity. 

When the very air seems to be laden with error and vice, 
believers should set a double watch as to what they hear 
and where they go. 

Others we see who are impeded by their poverty, and yet 
this need not be, for some of the Lord's poor are far ahead 
of other runners, and keep up all the better pace because 
they have so little to carry. 

It is sweet to live in the thoughts of those we love. 

We are apt to impute to Omnipotence a crushing energy 
which can scarcely take account of little and feeble and 
suffering things. 

If any of you have been brought to the Lord Jesus Christ 
by the ministry of any man whom God favors with his help, 
then that man must live forever in your hearts, and be re- 
membered in your prayers. You cannot escape from the 
obligation of intercession for the man who brought you to 
Jesus. 

We are not free from the worldliness which puts self first 
and God nowhere, else our various enterprises would be more 
abundantly supplied with the silver and the gold which are 
the Lord's, but which even professing Christians reserve for 
themselves. 

The sins of our youth will give us many a twist fifty years 
after they have been forgiven. 

4s 



50 spurgeon's gold. 

Look before you leap, lest a friend's advice should do yon 
more mischief than an enemy's slander. 

Oh ? be not Judas to Him who is Jesus to you ! 

Let us hold mutual discourse upon our experiences, make 
pleasant exchange of our knowledge, and aid each other by 
our gifts. 

That profession which is merely on the surface, like the 
gilt upon the gingerbread at a country fair, is too poor a 
thing to enter heaven. 

There is a singular stickiness about gold and silver. 

Few go wrong when they pray over their movements and 
use the judgment which God has given them. 

Instead of evil thoughts being less sinful than evil acts,. 
it may sometimes happen that in the thought the man may 
be worse than in the deed. He may not be able to carry 
out all the mischief that lurks within his designs, and yet in 
forming the design he may incur all the guilt. 

Sinner, thou needest not look for any good thing in 
thyself. 

Since conversion some of us have been led in a strange 
way, and every step of it has shown us that the Lord is good 
and true and ought to be trusted without stint. 

This is the spirit out of which fiends are made : first,, 
neglect, then omission, then treachery and rebellion. 

The wisest course is to keep out of the way of a man who 
has the complaint called the grumbles. 

Let the profligate judge for himself whether he is one grain 
better than the greediest skinflint whom he so much ridi- 
cules. 

Lord, let me be as low and unnoticed as Thou pleasest r 
but do enable me to bear fruit to the honor of Thy name and 
to the comfort of Thy people. 

The cross is the center of history. 

Each day has its mercy, and should render its praise. 
Fresh are the dews of each morning, and equally fresh are 
its blessings. 



spurgeon's gold. 51 

» 

God is in love with you. I think Aristotle said that it 
was impossible for one to be assured of another's love with- 
out feeling some love in return. I am not sure about that; 
but I think it is quite impossible to enjoy a sense of God's 
love without returning it in a measure. 

I believe our Lord takes infinite delight in a soul which 
He has new created. The Church of God depends not 
upon learned or moneyed men, but upon those who beseech 
God in supplicating faith. 

For the world to come between us and our Lord is very 
easy, but very terrible. 

Whatever falls from the skies is, sooner or later, good for 
the land ; whatever comes to us from God is worth having, 
even though it be a rod. 

It is well to edify saints as well as to benefit ourselves. 

Does it not mean that we are in Christ as the birds are 
in the air, which buoys them up and enables them to fly ? 
Are we not in Christ as the fish are in the sea? Our Lord 
has become our element, vital, and all surrounding. In 
Him we live, and move, and have our being. He is in us 
and we are in Him. Without Him we can do nothing and 
we are nothing. Thus are we emphatically in Him. 

At the house of the happiest knocks the hand of death. 

He who is equal with God deigns to hang upon the cross 
and die. I know of nothing that seems more out of rule 
and beyond expectation than this. 

If you make an idol of a child, either that child will die 
or something else will happen which will make your idol to 
be your burden. If you want to kill your husband, idolize 
him. If you desire ill to a beloved one, set him up in 
Christ's place. 

He will not call you His friend unless your are exceed- 
ingly careful to please Him in all things. 

Discouragement is very natural ; it is a native of the soil 
of manhood. 

We can procure our own sorrow, but we cannot produce 
our own comfort. 



52 spurgeon'^ gold. 

Suffer me to be the least among Thy true children rather 
than the chief among pretenders. 

They tell us there is as much of a tree under as above 
ground, and certainly it is so with a believer ; his visible 
life would soon wither were it not for his secret life. 

The sons of God, the twice-born. 

I put no fine face upon it — you are not perfect, no, not 
one of you; for "All have sinned and come short of the 
glory of God." 

One said to me when I was troubled, "Have you not a 
gracious God?" I answered, "Certainly I have." He 
replied, "What is the good of having Him, then, if you 
do not trust Him ? " I was sore smitten by that reply, and 
felt humbled in spirit. 

The hardest blow that He ever laid upon His child was 
inflicted by the hand of love 

If we were greater students of God, how much happier 
we should be. 

What poor creatures men are, and yet they dare to boast ! 

Think much, but say little \ be quick at work and slow at 
talk; and, above all, ask the great Lord to set a watch over 
your lips. 

As heaven and hell will never unite, so must it be plain 
that a saint and sin will never come together on any terms 
whatever. 

It is a materialistic expression, but there is something more 
in it than mere sentiment, that there remains among the 
substance of this globe a sacred relic of the Lord Jesus in 
the form of that blood and water. As no atom of matter 
ever perishes, that matter remains on earth even now. His 
body has gone into glory, but the blood and water are left 
behind. I see much more in this fact than I will now at- 
tempt to tell. 

When nothing else is left you God remains and God ap- 
pears. 

How often does it happen that those who are rejected of 
men are accepted of God. 



spurgeon's gold. 53 

It is no slight sin to discourage holy zeal and persever- 
ance in others. May we never be guilty of killing holy 
desires, even in children? How often has a burning desire 
in a boy's heart been quenched by his own father, who has 
thought him too impulsive or too ardent ! 

What the Spirit of God has written in this inspired Book 
is truth to us, and we allow no human teaching to rank side 
by side with it. 

Unexpected help shall come to us when affairs are at their 
worst. 

While we are ready for service, it is sweet also to be 
ready for glory. 

I have no patience with those who throw the blame on 
God when it belongs to themselves. 

Preoccupation of mind is a great safeguard from temp- 
tation. Fill a bushel with corn and you will keep out the 
chaff. 

This is a cheering thought for all believers, that the Lord 
has set apart him that is godly for Himself. He has taken 
measures to preserve all His chosen from all those who would 
defile and destroy them. He sets a hedge about them in 
providence, so that nothing shall by any means harm them. 
He has shut them up" from the enemy and sealed them up 
for perpetual preservation. 

We cannot calculate the range of moral influence; it is 
immeasurable. 

If anybody were to ask me to state the Gospel in a few 
words, I should answer — the Lord says, "Behold Me, be- 
hold Me." 

If you look down the list of the servants of God you 
will find that the most of them die before the object which 
they had in view is fully accomplished. It is true that we 
are immortal till our work is done; but then we usually 
think that our work is something other than it is. 

Nothing holds a man like his word, and nothing so fully 
fixes the course of action of the Lord our God as His own 
promise. 



54 spurgeon's gold. 

It is in our prosperity that we are tested. Men are not 
fully discovered to themselves till they are tried by fullness 
of success. 

We do not believe in fate — a blind, hard thing. 

Every girl thinks she could keep house better than her 
mother. 

Wounds are eloquent orators with a tender-hearted sur- 
geon ; expose your wounds to Jesus, and he will bind them 
up. 

Blunders are made about men, who should ever be es- 
teemed according to their native worth, and not according 
to their position and office. 

He has made you, and not you yourselves, and He that 
made you ought to have the use of you. 

There will be a remarriage of soul and body, and we 
shall be perfected, even as our risen Lord. Oh, the glory 
of that expected end ! 

I am bound to mention among the curiosities of the 
churches, that I have known many deeply spiritual Christ- 
ian people who have been afraid to rejoice. Much genuine 
religion has been " sicklied o'er with the pale cast of 
thought ! ' ' Some take such a view of religion that it is to 
them a sacred duty to be gloomy. 

Do not kick against suffering, for in so doing you may be 
fighting against God. 

Satan is very cunning, and knows how to change his argu- 
ment and yet keep to his design. 

Sin is a serpent which moralists cannot tame, charm they 
never so wisely. 

True Christians will endeavor to make their houses tem- 
ples, their meals sacraments, their garments vestments, and 
all their days holy days. 

This age also inclines greatly to those who have cast off 
the restraints of God's revelation and utter the flattering 
inventions of their own boasted "thought." , Your liberal 
spirits, your large-hearted men, your despisers of the old 
and hunters after the new — these are the idols of many. 



spurgeon's gold. 55 

The most difficult part of the training of young men is 
not to put the right thing into them, but to get the wrong 
thing out of them. 

What a pity that there is not a tax upon words. 

You must serve God with a single eye to the glory of God. 
If you attend a prayer-meeting, or teach a class, or preach 
a sermon, you must not do it with a view to your ownselves 
in any way, or it cannot be accepted. 

Unholy living is following upon unbelieving thinking. 

What have we to do with consequences? It is ours to 
do the right, and leave results with the Lord. 

It is about the best thing that happens to a Christian man 
when worldlings cut his acquaintance. " Come ye out from 
among them,'' is to many a severe command \ but all diffi- 
culty is removed when the world turns out from us, and 
casts out our name as evil. 

It is absolutely certain that God will hear the prayers of 
His. people. 

Sign nothing without reading it, and make sure that it 
means no more than it says. 

A look of vexation, or a word coldly spoken, or a little 
help thoughtlessly withheld, may produce long issues of 
regret. 

Work up the conversation till it reaches a fit stage for 
bringing in the Lord Jesus and saving truth ; but be sure 
that you never get men's minds ready, and then fail to do 
that which you are aiming at. 

The most spiritual people must eat to live. 

Willful people make up their mind, and then pray ; and 
this is sheer hypocrisy. 

Many of us now contemplate the approach of death with 
a calm quiet patience of hope. As our years advance we 
are not distressed with the thought that the time of our de- 
parture draws daily nearer. 

It were worth while for the whole Church to die rather than 
any truth of Scripture should be given up. 



56 spurgeon's gold. 

Sinners would like to be uplifted beyond all fear of death, 
they would like to be as happy as Christian people are \ but 
they do not want to pay the price — namely, obedience to 
God by faith in Jesus Christ. 

Godly people roof in the mansion with their prayers. 

I never did see either a perfect horse or a perfect man, 
and I never shall till two Sundays come together. 

The devil does not keep to his own side of the road, but 
drives in where we least expect him. 

It is always better to be openly without an attainment 
than to bear the form of it without in reality possessing it. 
A sham is a shame ; an unreal virtue is an undoubted vice. 

Night stretches her bat's wings, and is gone; she flies 
before the arrows of the advancing sun. 

Sin may be exhausted, the race may be numbered, time 
may be finished, and need may be ended, but mercy endureth 
forever. 

When we love some favored one we like to think of all 
our love passages in years gone by; and the Lord so loves 
His people that even when they are under His chastening 
hand He still delights to remember His former loving-kind- 
nesses. 

Our faith deals with what God says, not with what learned 
men think. 

God gives none up until they fatally resolve to give them- 
selves up, and even then His good Spirit strives within them 
as long as it is possible to do so, consistently with His holi- 
ness. 

Hang up self-confidence on a gallows high as that whereon 
Hainan was suspended, for it is an abominable thing. 

Happy is he who is happy in his children, and happy are 
the children who are happy in their father. 

White signifies perfection ; it is not so much a color as 
the harmonious union and blending of all the hues, colors, 
and beauties of light. 

Sin is the blast which withers all the flowers of life. 



spurgeon's gold. 57 

Abused and misrepresented both by good and bad, we 
learned to set small store by the judgment of men, so that 
when praise and flattery followed we had an antidote for 
the poisons. 

If you plead for certain mercies definitely and distinctly, 
with firm, unstaggering faith, you shall richly succeed. 

Those who die daily will die easily. I would to God we 
had learned this lesson. Let us live as dying men among 
dying men, and then we shall truly live. This will not 
make us unhappy, for surely no heir of heaven will fret be- 
cause he is not doomed to live here forever. 

Obedience cannot be learned at the university, unless it 
be at the College of Experience. 

Man must come distinctly to Him, and not to ceremo- 
nies, or sacrements, or priests, or churches, or assemblies, or 
creeds, or services, or doings, or feelings. There lies thy 
hope, and there alone. 

Oh, the depravity of our nature ! Some doubt whether 
it is total depravity. It deserves a worse adjective than that. 

Don't go to law unless you have nothing to lose; lawyers' 
houses are built on fools' heads. 

There are many divisions among men into nationalities, 
ranks, offices, and characters; but, after all, the deep divis- 
ions will always be two — the enemies and the servants of 
Christ Jesus. 

An unholy person will fall out with sin because it has in- 
jured his health or his credit, or has brought him into diffi- 
culties with his neighbors; but when these temporary results 
are ended he falls in love again with the same iniquity. 

Man' 's pride may carry him far if he is a great fool; but 
let him not suffer his pride to carry him into hell, for it 
certainly will never carry him out again. 

One brother who is quarrelsome can keep a whole church 
in trouble. One fellow knocking about the boat may stop 
the oarsmen, rend the sails, and run the boat on a rock. 
Oh, that the peace of God may be with all the saints in all 
the churches ! 



58 spurgeon's gold. 

Sometimes there is very much in words. Vital truth 
may hinge upon one word. 

■ Cheerfulness is most becoming in Christian men. 

The Lord loves the cry of the broken heart, because it 
distinctly recognizes Himself as the living God in every 
need sought after in prayer. From much of outward devo- 
tion God is absent. 

It is a misery of miseries that you should stand on such 
a vantage ground as many of you do and yet be lost. 

Be shy of people who are over polite, and don't be too 
fast with those who are forward and rough. 

I have learned, dear friends, that at the Red Sea of afflic- 
tion we see most of the right arm of God. 

In business men put out their money, foregoing its use 
themselves that it may, after a while, return to them with 
increase ; but carnal men are all for keeping the bird in the 
hand, and cannot wait for joys to come. 

God is never at a loss for agents. 

Others may break the bread to more people, but they 
cannot break better bread than the Gospel which you teach, 
for that is bread from our Saviour's own hand. 

Some, too, have hindered the children because they have 
been forgetful of the child's value. The soul's price does 
not depend upon its years. 

We need not ask for more talents ; we have quite as many 
as we shall be able to answer for. 

Any fool can drink ; in fact, many are great fools because 
they drink too much of poisonous liquors. Drinking is 
peculiarly the common-place act of sinners. 

It is a very important thing indeed that we should begin 
well. The start is not everything, but it is a great deal 

Long ago my experience taught me not to dispute with 
anybody about tastes and whims. 

Happy is that man who shall reach heaven unharmed and 
harmless, having neither gotten nor given a wound. 



spurgeon's gold. 59 

We have seen a child in a field of flowers filling its little 
hand eagerly and then dropping its posy, not for better but 
for other flowers. Many professors are such children. 

The world has never known a period less hopeful to the 
Gospel than the present. 

If we would but thoroughly enjoy what God has freely 
given us, we should be happy to the full, and even antici- 
pate the joys of heaven. 

Let us even desire to see our names in the celestial con- 
scription. Let us be willing to be dealt with just as our 
Lord pleases. Let no doubt intervene ; let no gloom en- 
compass us. % Dying is but going home — indeed, there is no 
dying for the saints. 

The man who will be guided by nobody is usually guided 
by some one more foolish or more knavish than himself. 

What God is doing to us in the way of trouble and trial 
is but his acknowledgment of us as true heirs, and the marks 
of his rod shall be our proof that we are true sons. 

If anybody thinks that he can change a heart by his own 
power, let him try with any one he pleases, a^nd he will soon 
be at a nonplus. 

Men are not angels, remember that; but they are not 
devils, and it is too bad to think them so. 

The life of Jesus .is a roll of cloth of gold, of the manu- 
facture of which the art is utterly lost. 

Sin is a bleeding at the heart. It is a disease which de- 
stroys the true life within, as well as the fruit of it without; 
therefore let every man beware of flattering himself that he 
is right with God because no glaring vice is manifest in his 
daily conversation. 

Vast is the difference between the chastisement of love 
and the infliction of justice. 

Let us not have a cupboard love for God because of His 
kind providence ; but let us love Him and praise Him for 
what He is and what He has done. 

The day of grace is never past to any soul that lives, as 
long as it is willing to believe in Jesus. 



60 spurgeon's gold. 

The oppression of the poor in their wages, the taking of 
undue advantage in trading, the incurring of debts without 
hope of being able to pay, and the like— these are varied 
forms of dishonesty, and are full of injury to others. 

Ours not to ask the reason, ours not to dispute about 
whether the deed is essential or noil-essential ; ours to obey 
right lovingly. 

If, indeed, the Lord be our refuge and strength, we are 
entitled to seek after a spirit which shall bear us above the 
dreads of common men. 

This great city (London) is like a seething caldron, boil- 
ing and bubbling up with infamous iniquity. 

Each page of the copy-book of life is marred with errors 
and blots; therefore the great Teacher pities his poor 
scholars. 

The more spiritual the duty, the sooner the soul wearies 
of it. An illustration of this is seen in the case of Moses, 
whose hands grew weary in prayer, while we never read that 
Joshua's hands hung down in fight. 

My will has fallen into God's will as a brook falls into a 
river. 

I have often said that I never know which to admire 
most, the incarnation of the Son of God or the indwell- 
ing of the Spirit of God. 

God requires not only that thou shouldst do that which 
is right, but that thou shouldst think that which is right, 
that thou shouldst love that which is right, ay, and that 
thou shouldst be that which is right. 

You and your sins must part, or God and you cannot be 
friends. 

The soul was drifting, and it fancied that the Church and 
the world were no longer what they were, just as men in a 
boat fancy that the shore is moving. 

You must come right out from the love of sin if you 
would be delivered from the guilt of sin. 

Love when it turns to jealousy is the fiercest of all pas- 
sions. 



spurgeon's gold. 61 

It is dreadful to think that a vile imagination, once in- 
dulged, gets the key of our minds, and can get in again 
very easily. 

I venture to say that the bulk of Christians spend more 
time in reading the newspaper than they do in reading the 
Word of God. 

It will be an awful thing to be mere empty barrels, and 
never know it till death deals a blow with his rod of iron 
and we answer to it with hollow sounds of despair. 

Those who are non-workers lose much by not keeping 
pace with those who are running the heavenly race. 

Who among us would wish to realize in his own person 
the fabled life of the Wandering Jew, or even of Prester 
John? Who desires to go up and down among the sons of 
men for twice a thousand years? 

It is a very great sin indeed to hinder anybody from 
coming to Christ. 

The corporeal absence of our Lord from our midst might 
seem to be a great loss to us; but we rejoice in it because it 
is for His own greater glory. 

It is a very good thing for Christians to be in the church ; 
but if you are in the church before you are in the Lord you 
are out of place. 

Keep clear of the man who does not value his own char- 
acter. 

If you mourn that you are not only a sinner, but the 
sinner with the definite article, the sinner above all others, 
you may still hope in the mercy of the Lord. 

Some texts are great candles, and have found out many; 
but probably there is not one tiny taper of Holy Writ which 
has not shed its saving beams, on some one or other of the 
Lord's precious ones. 

However great the promise, it is as sure as it is great. 

It is a rule with miracles, as well miracles of the Spirit as 
miracles of the body, that God never does what others can 
do. 



62 spurgeon's gold. 

Contentment should be natural to those who are born of 
the Spirit of God ; yea, we ought to go beyond content- 
ment, and cry, "Blessed be the Lord, who daily loadeth us. 
with benefits. ' ' 

Every mind needs a fixed point; we must have infallibil- 
ity somewhere ; my infallible guide is Holy Scripture. 

An aged woman once said that if the Lord Jesus Christ 
really did save her, He should never hear the last of it. 
Join with her in that resolve. 

God has more regard for faith than for all else that earth 
can yield Him. 

Beware of no man more than of yourself 3 we carry our 
worst enemies within us. 

In one single moment, ay, while the clock is ticking, 
Jesus Christ can take the scales from a blind man's eyes 
and let in such a flood of daylight that he shall see heaven 
itself. 

When self is our principle and end we rise no higher than 
ourselves, but when God becometh the life of our soul we 
follow after Him, and rise far above the highest point to 
which nature could conduct us. 

We must always be in earnest if we would be disciples 
of our earnest Lord. 

Pray for all ministers and workers, but pray also for me. 
I am of all men the most miserable if you deny me this. 

I admire the wisdom of Job, that he does not shirk the 
subject of death, but dwells upon it as an appropriate topic, 
saying : "I know that Thou wilt bring me to death, and to 
the house appointed for all living. ' ' 

You have not come before — that was wrong; but the 
times of your ignorance God winketh at, and bids you 
come now. 

Do you claim to have been absolutely perfect before your 
Maker from your childhood? Surely you must have a brow 
of brass to make such a boast. 

Scripture says, " Owe no man anything," which does not 
mean pay your debts, but never have any to pay. 



spurgeon's gold. 63 

» 
A flaw in the foundation is pretty sure to be followed by a 
crack in the superstructure. Do see to it that you lay a 
good foundation. 

We care not to be conspicuous as the poplar or majestic 
as the cedar, but we would be useful as the olive. 

The musician will be moving his fingers upon the table 
as if he were playing a tune ; the sailor will roll about in his 
walk on shore as if he were still on board ship ; and even 
so will the soul that communes with God rehearse its joys 
when it is busy with other matters. 

I trust not to my love of God, but to God's love to me. 

God's dealings with his chosen are often so mysterious 
that they cannot know them till they know Himself. 

I believe, dear friends, that if we are right-minded every 
doctrine of the Gospel will make us glad, every promise of 
the Gospel will make us glad, every precept of the Gospel 
will make us glad. 

Drunkenness and idleness clothe a man with rags ; these 
are the livery of sin. 

God will not overlook thee in the day when He gathers 
His own. He w T ill not forget thee, thou weakest of all the 
flock. Thou art needful to the completeness of the com- 
pany. 

Perhaps more than any other man I am faced by my own 
inefficiency and inability to address such an audience sa 
often, and to print all that is spoken. 

I confess it very quietly, but I have often wished that I 
had a little congregation, that I might watch over every 
soul in it; but now I am doomed to an everlasting dis- 
satisfaction with my work, for what am I among so many? 

A wise father does not care to restore a son to a position 
for which he has proved himself to be unfit. Even so has 
the Lord dealt with many backsliding ones; like David, 
they have been restored, but never to their former peace, 
prosperity, and power. 

My word is of no value at all, except as it is made up of 
the essence of the divine Word. 



64 spurgeon's gold. 

If you know these two things — yourself a sinner and 
Christ a Saviour — you are scholar enough to go to heaven. 

Beware of every one who swears. 

Surely, the devils themselves would at the first have scarce 
believed it, that there could exist a race of creatures so 
hardened as to refuse the love which visits them in grace. 

If you do not mean to serve Christ, at least stand out of 
the road and let other people serve Him. 

We all need the truth to come home to us with personal 
and forcible application, for we are always inclined to shift 
unpleasant inquiries upon others. 

Another deluge, more desolating even than the former, 
will come if ever the Church forgets her high calling and 
enters into confederacy with the world. 

There's no use in lying down and doing nothing because 
we cannot do everything as we should like. 

He who has to deal with young lambs or little children 
has great need to guard his movements. 

Past time urges us to diligence, for it has reported us in 
heaven ; and future time calls us to earnestness, for it must 
be short and may end this very day. And then ! 

Love is both the source and the channel and the end of 
the divine acting. 

He that serves God in body, soul, and spirit, to the ut- 
most of his power, finds new power given to him hour by 
hour, for God opens to him fresh springs. 

Language is a poor vehicle of expression when the soul 
is on fire ; words are good enough things for our cool judg- 
ment, but when thoughts are full of praise they break the 
back of words. 

A good man in a house is good store to the family. A 
converted daughter, a praying son, a holy husband, a gra- 
cious wife — why, these are the pillars, the ornaments, the 
buttresses of the house. 

In any business, never wade into water where you cannot 
see the bottom. 



spurgeon's gold, 65 

» 
Our temptation will be to think we could do exceedingly 
well in somebody's else sphere, but that we may be pardoned 
if we do not shine in our own. 

While God lives, truth is in the ascendant. 

In the resurrection the body shall be quickened, and the 
resurrection shall be to the body what regeneration has 
been to the soul. 

We have known houses turned into stables or menageries 
by those whose love, which should have gone out to human 
beings, went out to dogs and cats. People must have objects 
of affection, and if they have not the better they choose the 
worse. 

That pretty nonsense which some prattle about — "a 
larger hope." 

In the midst of human sin, if the trumpet were sounded 
* i up and away, ' ' you would be glad to hear it that you 
might speed to the fair land, where sin and sorrow will 
never assail you again. 

Believers do not escape the sorrows of this life ; but, then, 
no sorrow that comes to a Christian is sent as a penal in- 
fliction. It is not sent as a vindication of law, but as a 
tender parental discipline. 

God can soon cut short our usefulness, and he will do so 
if we cut short our love. 

Alas ! a spiritually thirsty soul is a choice rarity. Where 
shall I find him? With what joy will I salute him ! He is 
the man who will gladly receive the tidings of Jesus and 
His love. 

There is no shield for a guilty soul like the blood-red 
shield of the atonement. 

The thorn-crown commands homage as no other diadem 
ever did, for it braces men into heroes and martyrs No 
royalty is so all commanding as that which has for its in- 
signia the chaplet of thorn, the reed, the red cloak, and 
the five wounds. 

If sin were not so deceitful it would not be half so de- 
structive as it is. 

5s 



66 spurgeon's gold. 

We have seen men who were quite fair where their hats 
covered their foreheads, and thoroughly bronzed where the 
sun had looked upon them. A man's heart had need be 
covered with a veil of holy carefulness, or the world will 
get at it and brown it with evil. 

Patience has a golden hand. 

It is wonderful how little a person can live on if he will 
but keep himself in proper check and consume only that 
which is absolutely needful. 

By the ardor of prayer and the confidence of faith we 
may be caught up into Paradise, and there utter words 
which are beyond the latitude of earth, and are dated " from 
the Delectable Mountains. ' ' 

Holy perseverance is a great desideratum. 

You may lose a great deal for Christ, but you will never 
lose anything by Christ. You may lose for time, but you 
will gain for eternity; the loss is transient, but the gain is 
everlasting. 

It is not necessary to happiness that a man should be 
prosperous in business or applauded by mankind ; it is only 
needful that the Lord should smile on him. 

Evil thoughts are the marrow of sin. 

Let us go in for winning the ten pounds, if we can. For 
our Lord's sake let us trade in spiritual things with all our 
hearts. 

We need more meditation, more of this shooting of 
thought-arrows at a mark on which they will strike and 
stick, more of this throwing the thought-ball at the wall 
that we may catch it again. 

You, my dear friend, have a little faith; it is not much 
bigger than a grain of mustard-seed, but faith of that size 
has great power in it. 

The hearer of the Gospel is bound to be a repeater of the 
Gospel. We are all called upon, as we know the Lord, to 
tell to others what the Lord has told to us; and if we do 
not so, we are guilty of disobedience to a great Gospel pre- 
cept. 



spurgeon's gold. 67 

It were a sad sentence if we were bound over to dwell in 
this poor world forever. 

Are we not satisfied to take our lot with the holy men 
and women who already sleep in Jesus. 

When marriage is merry-age it is natural to desire a long 
life of it ; but when it is mar-age the thought of parting is 
more endurable. 

What if I call it "a. superfluity of naughtiness " to doubt 
Him whose life and death are crowded with infallible proofs 
of his unchanging love to us. 

Nobody is so wise but he has folly enough to stock a stall 
at Vanity Fair. 

This is one of the things we want very much — that every 
member of the Church should recognize that he is ordained 
to service. 

Among the early Christians the relatives of martyrs were 
a sort of aristocracy, and the martyrs themselves were re- 
garded as the nobility of the Church. We need a spice of 
the same spirit at this day. 

I have no desire to be famous for anything but preaching 
the old Gospel. 

We hurry through this Vanity Fair; before us lies the 
Celestial City and the coming of the Lord, who is the King 
thereof. 

Let us estimate children at their true valuation and we 
shall not keep them back, but we shall be eager to lead them 
to Jesus at once. 

Example is a great fashioner of character. 

If you are enabled to rise above fear in times of alarm 
then will those who see you say, " This is a man of God 
and this is God's work upon his soul. 

I joyfully expect to meet many of you in heaven, and to 
know you, and to commune with you. I should not like to 
float about in the future state without a personality, in the 
midst of a company of undefined and unknown beings. 
That would be no heaven to me. 



68 spurgeon's gold. 

We must watch even in the safest places, lest in an hour 
when we are not aware we should be battered and bruised 
by some mighty evil. 

Sins and debts are always more than we think them to be. 

Men do not usually care to spend a pound in the hope 
of getting back a groat and no more, and yet when the 
soul is given up for the sake of worldly gain the loss is 
greater still, and not even the groat remains. 

"Thou shalt not kill," may be broken by anger, hate, 
malice, and the desire for revenge. 

If the Supreme should say, "Live here forever," it were 
a malediction rather than a benediction. 

We must be willing to hook on anywhere ; be leader or 
shaft-horse ; be first or last; be sower or reaper, as the Lord 
ordains. Have no choice, and then you will find satisfac- 
tion. 

It is more necessary for us that we should make a discov- 
ery of our faults than of our virtues. 

The very things which men most dread, namely, the fall- 
ing of mountains and the gaping open of the earth, will 
become the desire of terrified sinners at the last. 

Do not trick yourself out in the weeds of your own re- 
pentance, much less in the fig-leaves of your own resolutions, 
but come to God in Christ Jesus in all the nakedness of 
your sin and everlasting mercy will cover both you and 
your sins. 

When God means a creature to fly he gives it wings, 
and when he intends men to preach he gives them abilities. 

Desire no other forces for God's work than God Himself 
ordains to use. 

As I am sure to seek after that which I desire, and am 
sure to desire that which I conceive to be happiness, it is 
clear that my conception of happiness will largely regulate 
my whole course of life. 

Those who are most pure and honorable have yet their 
shortcomings and errors to mourn over. 



spurgeon's gold. 69 

» 

The way to heaven by works is only possible to a man 
who is absolutely perfect ; and none of you are in that con- 
dition. 

We do not believe in the Kismet of blind fate, but we 
believe in the predestination of infinite wisdom, and there- 
fore we say, "It is the Lord, let him do what seemeth to him 
good." 

When faith evaporates there is a speedy departure oi 
spiritual power. 

We are getting on in years, some of us, but we do not 
wish to feel old ; at least, we want to keep as much of the 
freshness and joy of youth as we well can. 

I have sometimes wished that I had nothing else to do 
but to dwell with God in prayer, praise, and preaching. 
Alas ! one has to come down from the mount of the trans- 
figuration and meet the lunatic child and the quarrelsome 
scribes at the bottom of the hill. 

Hundreds would never have known want if they had not 
first known waste. 

Has it ever struck you how much the life of Christ with 
His people lay in intense familiarity with them? 

Let it not be thought that faith is contrary to reason. No ; 
it is not unreasonable for a little child to believe its father's 
statements, though it be quite incapable of perceiving all 
their bearings. 

When a sinner knows that his salvation does not lie in 
himself at all, but wholly in Christ, then he discovers the 
great secret. 

Some time ago a person who wanted, I suppose, to make 
me feel my own insignificance, wrote to say that he had met 
with a number of negroes who had read my sermons with 
evident pleasure, and he wrote that he believed they were 
very suitable for what he was pleased to call "niggers." 
Yes, my preaching was just the sort of stuff for niggers. 
The gentleman did not dream what sincere pleasure he 
caused me, for if I am understood by poor people, by serv- 
ant-girls, by children, I am sure I can be understood by 
others. 



70 spurgeon's gold. 

May God drive every unconverted sinner into a corner, 
and so compel him to yield to grace. 

Though you mourn over the disciples, rejoice over their 
Master. 

Let it never be forgotten that when a man is down he has 
a grand opportunity for trusting in God. 

Few men can keep up a deceit when they approach their 
end. 

In certain crafts and trades there are selfish reasons for 
keeping their knowledge a secret, but nothing of this kind 
can appertain to the profession of godliness. Having found 
this honey, so abundant and so free to all comers, nature 
itself bids us call our brethren to see our treasure and urge 
them to partake of its sweetness. 

A bold man took this motto: "While I live I'll crow;" 
but our motto is: "While I live I'll praise." 

It seems as if the Master might pass over sin in a thou- 
sand others, but He cannot wink at failure of love in His 
own espoused one. 

Some persons have no hope, or only one of which they 
might justly be ashamed. Ask many who deny the Scrip- 
tures what is their hope for the future. "I shall die like 
a dog," says one. "When I'm dead there's an end of 
.me." If I had such a wretched hope as that, I certainly 
would not go about the world proclaiming it. I should 
not think of gathering a large congregation like this and 
saying to you: "Brethren, rejoice with me, for we are all 
to die like cats and dogs. ' ' It would never strike me as 
a matter to be gloried in. 

That man who says "It is my Father's will" is the 
happy man. 

Men turn their faces to hell and hope to get to heaven ; 
why don't they walk into the horse-pond and hope to be 
dry? 

No man comes to the Father but by the Son, and no man 
long keeps to the Father who does not keep to his faith in 
the Son. 



spurgeon's gold. 71 

The carrion which professors can now feed upon is dis- 
gusting to the very thought of a real Christian. Entertain- 
ments are got up among religious people which are un- 
worthy even of decent worldlings. Many true hearts are 
deeply wounded by this terrible degeneracy. Were it not 
for a small remnant we had been as Sodom, and been made 
like unto Gomorrah. 

Lord, let me never be what I cannot be forever. 

I have lived to see many brilliant projects lighted and 
left to die out in smoke. I have heard of schemes which 
were to illuminate the world, but not a spark remains. 

None of us can wish our departed friends back from their 
thrones. Since they have gone to be where Jesus is and to 
enter so fully into the most blissful fellowship with Him and 
the Father, we would not have them return, even for an in- 
stant, to this poor country. We only wish that our turn for 
migration may come soon. We would not be too long 
divided from our fellows. 

When will you cease to censure others and reserve your 
severity and your critical observations for your own con- 
duct? 

The art of stretching is uncommonly general nowadays. 
Unseen showers of frogs fall regularly when newspapers are 
slack. 

The wealth of nations is nothing to the wealth of Jesus. 

Princes should behave as princes. Their haunts should 
be in palaces and not amid dung-heaps. How, then, is it 
that some who profess and call themselves Christians are 
found raking in questionable amusements to discover pleas- 
ure, and many others groping amid sordid avarice to find 
satisfaction in wealth. 

Nothing will oil the wheels of the chariot of life so well 
as more of the praising of God. 

The introduction of a holy thought into carnal minds is 
a miracle as great as to get a beam of light into a blind eye 
or a breath of life into a dead body. 

It is as great a marvel as the making of a world that any 
one of our race should attain to righteousness. 



72 spurgeon's gold. 

What can the devil offer the joyous Christian? Why, if 
he were to say to him : " I will give thee all the kingdoms 
of the world and the glory thereof if thou wilt fall down 
and worship me," the believer would reply to him : "Fiend, 
I have more than that. I have perfect contentment ; I have 
absolute delight in God. ' ' The devil will speedily quit such 
a man as that, for the joy of the Lord is an armor through 
which he cannot send the dagger of his temptation. 

Dog won't eat dog, but men will eat each other up like 
cannibals, and boast of it, too. 

We are enriched when we lose fictitious virtues. 

We have seen a hedge all thick with dry leaves through- 
out the winter, and neither frost nor wind has removed the 
withered foliage, but the spring has soon made a clearance. 
The new life dislodges the old, pushing it away as unsuit- 
able to it. So our old corruptions are best removed by the 
growth of new graces. 

The unregenerate man has always an idol. He will wor- 
ship anything rather than his God; yea, he will sooner 
worship himself than his Saviour. 

Our faith is at home in wonderland, where the Lord's 
thoughts are seen to be as high above our thoughts as the 
heavens are above the earth. 

Constantly keep up your confession. There are times 
when you will be inclined to put your flag away into the 
canvas case and hide your coat-of-arms in the cellar. Then 
you may fitly judge that the devil is getting advantage over 
you, and that it is time that you ceased to be beguiled by 
his sorceries. Tear up the wrappings, throw the bag away, 
and nail your flag aloft where every eye can see it. 

The age is growing more and more irreverent, unbeliev- 
ing, indifferent. 

Every one can see that there is a grave distinction between 
sins of infirmity and willful transgressions. A man may 
splash us very badly with the wheel of his carriage as he 
passes by, and we may feel vexed, but the feeling would 
have been very much more keen if he had thrown mud into 
our face with deliberate intent. 



spurgeon's gold. 73 

» 

Some people were born on the first of April, and are 
always hoping without sense or reason. 

Young man, do not run up bills which your riper years 
will find it hard to pay. 

All means are to be used, notwithstanding the eternal pur- 
pose. of God; for that purpose includes means and their 

uses. 

If there be a commandment which you do not relish it 
ought to be a warning to you that there is something wrong 
in your heart that needs setting right. 

When we rise again our nature will find its home amid the 
communion of saints. When the Lord Jesus Christ had 
risen again His first resort was the room where His dis- 
ciples were gathered. His first evening was spent among the 
objects of His love. Even so, wherever we are we shall seek 
and find communion with the saints. 

There is no good in sin in any shape or way. 

Don't wait for helpers. Try those two old friends, your 
strong arms. 

We ought never to go where we shall be out of the at- 
mosphere of heaven. 

Men who never smelt powder know exactly how a com- 
mander should have acted in a battle ; probably they would 
themselves have run away at the first shot. Safely on land, 
the wiseacre decides most positively how the pilot should 
steer — which sail should be hoisted and which should be 
put away. If he were on board the laboring bark he would 
be lying down below, forgotten as a dead man out of mind. 

Though sloth promises ease it cheats its votaries. Of all 
unrest there is none more wearisome than that of having 
nothing whatever to do. 

"Whosoever" includes the slum people, even the poorest 
of the poor; but it does not exclude the carriage people; 
not even the richest of the rich. "Whosoever" beckons 
to the educated and looks favorably upon the cultured and 
the refined ; but none the less does it invite the illiterate, 
to whom all learning is an unattainable mystery. 



74 spurgeon's gold. 

God prefers the prayer of a broken heart to the finest 
service that ever was performed by priests and choirs. 

Heaven's long-suffering still runs like a silver thread 
through the centuries. 

A thrifty housewife is better than a great income. 

Self-consciousness is a sure sign that there is not much 
depth of grace. 

The wide difference between wisdom and knowledge is 
forgotten by many ; they hoard up knowledge of a peculiar 
sort like collectors of coins, and yet they use it not as mer- 
chants use money, but keep it for show, a rarity to be looked 
at, labeled, put away in a glass case, and exhibited to those 
who are admirers of curios and rarities. 

Sin has been pardoned at such a price that we cannot 
henceforth trifle with it. 

Some things being once done are done with, and you 
need not further meddle with them ; but you have never 
done with rejoicing. "Rejoice ever more." 

Perhaps you have lost the friendship of many by becom- 
ing disciples of the Lord Jesus. I know one who became 
a member of this church ; she had moved in high and fashion- 
able circles, but she said to me, "They have left me — 
every one of them." I said, "I am very thankful; for it 
will save you the trouble of quitting them. They will do you 
no good if they profess to be your friends ; and they will do 
you less harm by giving you the cold shoulder. ' ' 

Nothing is more mischievous than to cling to a name 
when the thing for which it stands has disappeared. 

Lukewarmness of love to truth is the real evil to be depre- 
cated in these times. 

A man who becomes a great runner has to put himself in 
training and to keep himself in it ; and that training con- 
sists very much of the exercise of running. Those who 
have distinguished themselves for speed have not suddenly 
leaped into eminence, but have long been runners. If a 
man dreams that he can become mighty in prayer just when 
he pleases he labors under a great mistake. 



spurgeon's gold. 75 

I must confess I never read the story of the Master's 
death, knowing what I do of the pain of crucifixion, with- 
out deep anguish. 

To carry two faces under one hat is very common. 

The deserts, where the sand is always shifting, where if 
the traveler once loses his bearings he is doomed to certain 
death, with the vulture's maw as his only sepulchre. 

So many people have a " lean to" religion. If their 
minister, or some other leading person, were taken away, 
their back wall would be gone, and they would come to the 
ground. In some cases the wife and mother, or the husband 
and father, or the friend and teacher, constitute the main 
support of the individual's religion; he leans upon others, 
and if these fail him there is an end of his hope. 

No man was ever yet found guilty of believing in God 
too much. 

A man who knocks a horse about ought to be put in har- 
ness himself and be driven about. 

Thoughts of heaven prevent discontent with our present 
lot. 

However pleased the parents had been with the little one 
when it was a babe, they would soon be deeply distressed 
if year after year it still remained a tiny thing; indeed, 
they would consider it a great calamity to be the parents of 
a dwarf. What, then, shall we say of those in our churches 
who never grow? They are no forwarder after fifty years! 
Infants at sixty years of age ! 

It is a pity to pretend to predict the future, for we cer- 
tainly cannot see an inch before us. 

I believe that one of the sweetest joys under heaven 
comes out of the severest suffering when patience is brought 
into play. 

There is not only an election from the world, but an elec- 
tion out of the elect. Twelve were taken from the disciples; 
three were taken out of the twelve ; one greatly beloved was 
taken out of the three. 

We believe in many conversions ; we look for them, and 
we have them. 



76 spurgeon's gold. 

If your prayers have but few words in them, and are 
mainly made up of crying and tears, yet in this they are 
like those of your Saviour, and so you may hope that they 
will be accepted. 

Trade with small capital means personal work and drudg- 
ery, long hours and few holidays, plenty of disappointment 
and small gains. It means working with might and main, 
and doing the thing with all your heart and mind. 

Home is no home where the children are not in obedience; 
it is rather a pain than a pleasure to be in it. 

Schemes of union are of small value ; it is the spirit of 
union which is wanted. 

Not even for the present are the reputations of the godly 
injured in the sight of God, and as for the future, they shall 
suffer no tarnishing. Soon there shall be a resurrection 
of good names as well as of bodies ; the Lord shall restore 
the honor and renown of each slandered believer. 

There is nothing more obnoxious to our divine Lord 
than distrust of Him. 

It is often so to this day, that the servants of God smart 
because of disobedience. They are chastened for their sin. 

Outward ordinances cannot secure a blessing; but the 
spirit of obedience, which leads to a careful observance of 
them according to the divine command, is a blessed fruit of 
the Spirit. 

A hallowed influence lingers about the scenes of faithful 
labors. 

Signing our petitions with the name Jesus ! May we be 
importunate only in prayers to which we are warranted to 
set that august name; and then, boldly using His name and 
authority, we need be under no apprehension of failure. 

I receive anything I ask for when I mention His name, 
and so I am sure that He is in wonderful high repute 
above. 

As the seed develops into the flower, so the buried body 
is merely the germ out of which will come the spiritual 
body. 



spurgeon's gold. 77 

» 

We ought to keep two bears, and learn to bear and for- 
bear with one another. 

The cares and labors of the day may carry the thoughts 
to other objects, even as a finger may turn the needle to 
the east or west, 'but no sooner is the pressure removed than 
the thoughts fly to the Well-Beloved just as the needle moves 
to its place. 

We are not permitted to die at our own will. That were 
suicidal and improper. 

In a little time — how little a time none of us can tell — 
we shall be where the inhabitant shall never be sick again. 
We are on our way to eternal health. 

"The serpent's gospel," say you, " what is that ? " It 
is another name for the gospel of modern thought — that 
gospel which casts a doubt upon the threatenings of the law 
and even denies them altogether. 

That which is born with fear dies with fear. 

One walking with me observed, with some emphasis: "I 
do not believe as you do. I am an Agnostic. " "Oh," 
I said to him, " that is a Greek word, is it not? The Latin 
word, I think, is ignoramus." He did not like it at all. 
Yet I only translated his language from Greek to Latin. 

Perfection lies in the observation of little things ; and 
nothing is little by which a man can do a little good. 

I'd rather walk ten miles to get out of a dispute than half 
a mile to get into one. 

If we would not be run down by transgressors of one sort 
or another, we shall have need to be always on the watch. 

Sin is as subtle and as deadly as the foul gas which bears 
within it the seeds of plague, and therefore the utmost cau- 
tion must be used that we keep as far from its occasions and 
temptations as we possibly can. 

We certainly should never fear death if we had no sin. 

What is man's word compared with God's word? It is 
as chaff to the wheat at worst, and as mere gold-leaf to solid 
bullion at best. 



78 spurgeon's gold. 

If the tender mercy of God has visited us, and done so 
much more for us than I can tell or than you can hear, let 
us ourselves exhibit tender mercy in our dealings with our 
fellow-men. 

Your tongue is too soft a thing to influence dull minds ; 
you must influence such by your lives. 

One book charmed us all the days of our youth. Is there 
a boy alive who has not read it? " Robinson Crusoe" was 
a wealth of wonders to me; I could have read it over a 
score of times and never have wearied. I am not ashamed 
to confess that I can read it even now with ever fresh de- 
light. 

The tendency to depreciate the present because of the 
glories of the past is injurious. 

If a man is so proud that he will not see his faults he will 
only quarrel with you for pointing them out to him. 

If any one says the four Gospels are forgeries, let him try 
to write a fifth, which shall be like the other four. 

No wise man will swerve an inch from his path to please 
those who are mad with sin, nor will he break his heart be- 
cause idiotic sinners make a jest of his uprightness. 

He who will not go to the fire ought not to complain that 
the room is cold. 

The religion of Jesus Christ acts upon truthful, reasonable, 
logical principles ; it is sanctified common sense. 

There is a laudable pursuit of gain without which busi- 
ness would not be properly carried on \ but there is a line, 
scarcely as broad as a razor's edge, between diligence in 
business and greediness for gain. 

Love is law; the law of love is the strongest of all laws. 

The sin which at the first seemed a dainty luxury, sweet 
to their palate, has now developed into a corrosive poison 
in their bowels, eating their flesh as with fire, and burning 
up their spirits. Lust was their pilot ; the siren of pleasure 
lured them on, and now they are wrecks, breaking into 
pieces on the rocks. 



spurgeon's gold. 79 

Christ's love is the sun and our love is the moonlight, 
which we are able to give forth because the sun hath looked 
upon us. 

There are not so many hours in a year as there may be 
thoughts in an hour. 

I think that it is always better to get the place quite full. 
It breeds a kind of enthusiasm. 

When religion is at a discount and godliness is derided., 
then hypocrites and unsound professors desert the cause. 
It is astonishing what a little shake will get rid of the com- 
monplace members of our churches. 

Forgiveness begets gratitude, gratitude creates love, and 
love brings forth holiness. 

The story of the great Lover of the souls of men, Who 
gave Himself for their salvation, is still, in the hand of the 
Holy Ghost, the greatest of all forces in the realm of mind. 

Perhaps there is no greater soul-saving text in the Bible 
than this: " God so loved the world that He gave His only 
begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in Him should not 
perish, but have everlasting life." I must have conversed 
with more than a hundred persons who have found the Lord 
through this blessed verse. I am speaking very moderately, 
for I think I might say that I have known several hundreds 
who have been guided into liberty by this pole-star text. 

There are no "ifs" where there is a God. 

Boasters are never worth a button with the shank off. 

In the shop of a diamond merchant at Amsterdam we 
saw great machinery and much power all brought to bear 
on what seemed to be a small piece of glass. One might 
be sure of the value of that transparent morsel if he would 
but look around and see what skill and labor were being 
expended upon it. God has laid out for the good of a soul 
the watchfulness of angels, the providence of this world, 
the glory ol the next, the councils of eternity, Himself and 
all that He hath, the Holy Spirit and all his divine influ- 
ences — yea, he spared not His only Son. Say, soul, what 
must thou be worth thus to have all heaven's thought and 
power and love laid out for thee? 



80 spurgeon's gold. 

There is no warmth like heart warmth, and no testimony 
like that of experience. 

You have made up your mind about a great many things ; 
unmake your mind, and be as wax to the seal before Him. 

You scarcely meet with a man who will not acknowledge 
that he is a sinner. But it is one thing to call yourself a 
sinner, and quite another thing to feel it. 

You are well aware that the division of the Bible into 
chapters has only been made for convenience sake, and is 
not a matter of inspired arrangement. I may add that it has 
been clumsily made, and not with careful thoughtfulness, 
but as roughly as if a woodman had taken an axe and chop- 
ped the book to pieces in a hurry. 

The adversities of to-day are a preparatory school for the 
higher learning. 

We have read that when Bernard visited a monastery of 
ascetic monks, they were shocked because the saddle on 
which he rode was most sumptuously adorned. They 
thought that this ill became his profession as a meek and 
lowly man. Judge of their surprise and satisfaction when 
he told them that he had never so much as noticed what it 
was wmereon he sat. The fact was that the horse and sad- 
dle were not his own, but had been lent to him by his uncle, 
and their nature had not been perceived by him during the 
whole of his journey. This is the way to use all earthly 
treasure, making small account whether we have it or not. 

Crucifixion was a death worthy to be invented by devils. 
The pain which it involved was immeasurable. 

Our God has made the day-spring from on high to visit us. 
Our life is bright with these visits as the sky with stars. 

Many hours in the day have to be spent upon our occu- 
pations. We wake up in the morning and think of what 
we have to do. We go to bed wearied at night by what we 
have done. This is as it should be, for God did not make 
us that we might sport and play like leviathan in the deep. 
Even in Paradise man was bidden to dress the garden. 
There is something to be done by each man, and specially 
by each Christian man. 



spurgeon's gold. 81 

Some are great liars, but they are hardly conscious of it ; 
they have talked themselves into believing their own bom- 
bast. 

The age of revival has had its men mighty in prayer. 

He who respects his wife will find that she respects him. 

God is not glorified by unused graces. 

Experience has taught the wise observer that sin may 
be bound by sin, and one ruling passion may hold the rest 
in check. One man is kept from licentiousness by covet- 
ousness ; he would be glad to revel in vice if it were not so 
expensive ; another would be a rake and a spendthrift, but 
then it would not be respectable, and thus his pride checks 
his passions. This restraint of sin by sin is no proof that 
the nature is one jot the better, but that it puts on a fairer 
appearance, and is more likely to deceive. 

He who overvalues himself undervalues his Saviour. 

As the multitudes streamed forth from the hundred gates 
of Thebes, so do sins proceed from the heart. 

The capacity to enjoy God, and to understand His super- 
lative excellence, is the grandest faculty that a being can 
possess, and he that has it not is dead while he liveth. 

Look at the many who died before we came into the 
world. Some of them have been in heaven together now 
for thousands of years. To them it must seem that they 
were only divided by a moment's interval; their continents 
of fellowship have made the channel of death seem but a 
streak of sea. Soon we shall take the same view of things. 

If in the quiver of God's providence there should lie an 
arrow which shall to-day bring us death, it would also bring 
us glory. 

A good wife and health are a man's best wealth. 

The greatest worldly advantages cannot compensate for 
the loss of spiritual privileges. 

Those who rejoice without knowing why can be driven 
to despair without knowing why. 

Many processes are in vigorous action which tend to de- 
stroy faith. 

6s 



82 spurgeon's gold. 

If a man should labor to be rich after the African fashion, 
and should accumulate a large store of shells and beads, 
when he came home to England he would be a beggar, 
even though he had a ship-load of such rubbish. So he who 
gives his heart and soul to the accumulation of gold and 
silver coin is a beggar when he comes into the spiritual realm, 
where such round medals are reckoned as mere forms of 
earth, non-current in heaven, and of less value than the 
least of spiritual blessings. 

The more we endure, the more we test the faithfulness of 
God, the more we prove His love, and the more we per- 
ceive His wisdom. 

I shall enter into no dispute about the atoms of the body, 
nor deny that the particles of our flesh, in the process of 
their decay, may be taken up by plants and absorbed into 
the bodies of animals, and all that. I do not care one jot 
about identity of atoms ; there may not be a solitary ounce 
of the same matter, but yet identity can be preserved ; and 
it must be preserved if I read my Bible aright. 

God sends every bird its food, but He does not throw it 
into the nest. 

He who is making us ready for heaven is making heaven 
ready for us. 

Those who play at the game of chess know that great 
circumspection is needed. Your opponent is working to- 
ward a design of which you know nothing, and while you 
imagine that you are doing exceedingly well he is entrap* 
ing you. The game of life, as against Satan, is one in 
which his age, his long practice, his superior skill, and his 
unscrupulousness give him an immense advantage over our 
poor self-conceited folly. 

I am afraid that in the hour of our mirth and the day of 
our prosperity many of our prayers and our thanksgivings 
are hypocrisy. 

The sinner who seeks to save himself by his own good 
works, or by any other means, toils without result. It is as- 
tonishing what pains men will take in this useless drudgery. 



spurgeon's gold. 83 

» 

For a man to abstain from using force when he has none 
to use is no great virtue; it reminds one of the lines of 
Cowper's ballad: 

" Stooping down, as needs he must 
Who cannot sit upright." 

But for a man to have force ready to his hand, and then to 
abstain from using it, is a case of self-restraint, and possibly 
of self-sacrifice, of a far nobler kind. 

To injure another is worse by far than being injured our- 
selves. 

If a man is ignorant and holds his tongue, no one will 
despise him. 

Lord ! help me to soar like the lark, but keep me clear of 
the net. 

Business, marriage, traveling, recreation, literature, mu- 
sic, art, should all be placed in the same subordinate condi- 
tion. They are not distinctly spiritual, and as mere human 
matters they may be either right or wrong ; but it is ours to 
lay the yoke upon them and make them serve our spiritual 
designs. They will make admirable servants ; we can never 
allow them to be our masters. 

The Saviour offered no petitions by way of mere form; 
His supplications arose out of an urgent sense of His need 
of heavenly aid. 

They that are not moral, they that are not honest, they 
that are not kind, they that are not truthful, are far from 
the kingdom. How can these be the children of God who 
are not even decent children of men? 

Tarry here just a minute to recollect that the angels also 
are, according to your measure and degree, at your call. 
You have but to pray to God, and angels shall bear you up 
in their hands lest you dash your foot against a stone. We 
do not think enough of these heavenly beings ; yet are they 
all ministering spirits sent forth to minister to those that are 
heirs of salvation. 

A loveless religion is good for nothing. 

Not those who pull the longest faces are the most in 
earnest. 



84 spurgeon's gold. 

If I had the option of my condition in life, I would rather 
have less earth and more heaven than more earth and less 
heaven. 

We have seen the exhibitor turn away in utter disgust when 
some uninitiated spectator has offered pence where pounds 
would not have been accepted. The jeweler or artist has 
been as much offended as if he had been personally insulted 
by such a depreciation of his valuables. Do you wonder that 
the Lord God is grieved when men set a base price upon his 
priceless grace, and begin to bargain and chaffer as to what 
sins they will give up and what duties they will perform? 

Sin is not a splash of mud upon man's exterior, it is a filth 
generated within himself. 

Every church is to our Lord a more sublime thing than a 
constellation in the heavens ; as He is precious to his saints, 
so are they precious to Him. « 

Because our Saviour's reasoning was unanswerable, ' ( there- 
fore the Jews sought again to take Him." When men are 
convinced against their wills, when the heart struggles against 
the head, it usually happens that they turn persecutors. If 
they cannot answer holy arguments with fair reasonings, they 
can give hard answers with stones. 

There is a piety in keeping your work well in hand, in 
having the house right, the business in order, the daily task 
well done. 

He has his money best spent who has the best wife. 

Secret backslidings end in public abominations. 

If we are out of temper ourselves, we plead the weather, 
or a headache, or our natural temperament, or aggravating 
circumstances ; we are never at a loss for an excuse for our- 
selves. Why should not the same ingenuity be used by our 
charity in inventing apologies and extenuations for others? 

We usually fear because we have cause for fear; when all 
is right we shall bid farewell to terror. 

The joy which God commands is a joy in which it is im- 
possible to go too far. It is a heavenly joy, based upon 
things which will last forevermore. 



spurgeon's gold. 85 

The raw material for a devil is an angel. The raw ma- 
terial for the son of perdition was an apostle ; and the raw 
material for the most horrible of apostates is one who is 
almost a saint. I say no more than I mean, and than his- 
tory can prove. There have usually been splendid traits of 
character about men who have been unfit to live. 

If ever I have been satisfied with what I have done for 
the Lord I have ivnariabiy found my service to prove bar- 
ren. 

After the miser comes the prodigal. 

Occupation is the remedy for many an internal sorrow. 

A blind man may be a first-rate musician, and in his own 
department he may be a master, but if he ventures to dog- 
matize upon color and artistic portraiture he is more worthy 
of ridicule than of reverence. Carnal men have not the 
needful taste by which divine doctrine is discerned. 

The Son is His glory, His darling, His alter ego, His 
other self — yea, one God with Him. 

The thought of evil is sin; even a wanton desire is a 
blemish in the life, and an unchaste imagination is a stain 
upon the character in the sight of God, though not in the 
sight of man. 

Perhaps you have almost taken it for granted that you 
love Jesus; but it must not be taken for granted. Some 
of you have been born in a religious atmosphere, you have 
lived in the midst of godly people, and you have never been 
out into the wicked world to be tempted by its follies; there- 
fore you come to an immediate conclusion that you must 
assuredly love the Lord. This is unwise and perilous. I 
would have you fully assured of your love to Jesus, but I 
would not have you deceived by a belief that you love Him 
if you do not. Lord, search us and try us ! 

Faith travels by an unseen track to honor and glory, 
neither shall anything turn her aside. 

Those who are helped in their better days generally 
forget the debt, or repay it with unkindness. 

The presence of God is the only universal preservative. 



86 spurgeon's gold. 

Lord, whether I live long or not, I leave to Thee; but 
help me to live while I live that I may live much. Thou 
canst give life more abundantly; let me receive it, and let 
my life be filled, yea, packed and crammed, with all manner 
of holy thoughts and words and deeds to Thy glory. 

Religion has cost many of its disciples somewhat dear ; but 
it has cost nothing compared with its worth. 

Trade develops a man's perseverance, patience, and cour- 
age ; it tests honesty, truthfulness, and firmness. It is a 
singularly excellent discipline for character. 

I will say broadly that I have more confidence in the 
spiritual life of the children that I have received into this 
church than I have in the spiritual condition of the adults 
thus received. I will even go further than that, and say that 
I have usually found a clearer knowledge of the Gospel and 
a warmer love to Christ in the child converts than in the 
man converts. I will even astonish you still more by saying 
that I have sometimes met with a deeper spiritual experience 
in children of ten and twelve than I have in certain persons 
of fifty and sixty. 

God has made us, body and soul, and He would have us 
serve Him with both. 

Depend upon it, plowing the air is not half so profitable 
as it is easy ; he who hopes in this world for more than he 
can get by his own earnings hopes to find apricots on a crab- 
tree. 

Neglect of prayer makes prayer become hard work. 

Thou hast but little sunshine, but thy long glooms are 
wisely appointed thee, for perhaps a stretch of summer weather 
would have made thee as a parched land and a barren wilder- 
ness. Thy Lord knows best, and He has the clouds and the 
sun at His disposal. 

He who prays aright with his heart will not much err with 
foot and hand and head. 

Often it happens with those who try to get better by their 
own good works, that their conscience is awakened by the 
effort, and they are. more conscious of sin than ever. 



spurgeon's gold. 87 

» 
If you were to take out of the Scriptures all the stories 
that have to do with poor afflicted men and women, what a 
very small book the Bible would become, especially if to- 
gether with the stories you removed all the psalms of the 
sorrowful, all the promises for the distressed, and all the pas- 
sages which belong to the children of grief. This Book, in- 
deed, for the most part is made up of the annals of the poor 
and despised. 

Do not get to be so heavenly-minded that you cannot put 
up with the little vexations of the family. 

All the neighbors are cousins to the rich man, but the poor 
man's brother does not know him. 

Labor is lightened by being diversified. 

A good wife does not sit idly by the sea watching for 
a sail, but she sets the house in order for her husband's re- 
turn. She who sits looking out of the window or study- 
ing almanacs, and has no provision made for the home- 
coming, shows but scant love for her lord. 

Be always true to your convictions about what Christ's 
commandments are. Carry them out at all hazards, and 
carry them out at once. 

A doubtful faith will leave a doubt about your security ; 
but those who believe out and out shall have joy and peace 
through believing. 

Miserable professors who simply go to a place of worship 
because they ought to go, and who are very good because 
they dare not be anything else, they have no joy in the Lord. 
They go to the devil for their joy ; they openly confess that 
they must have a bit of pleasure sometimes, and therefore 
they go to questionable amusements. No wonder that they 
are found in Satan's courts, looking up to him for delights, 
since they find no rejoicing in the ways of the Lord. 

It is very seldom that a sluggard is honest ; he owes at least 
more labor to the world than he pays. 

Neither would I choose my lot on earth, but leave it with 
God to choose for me. 

We shall never hear much pious conversation till we have 
more thorough conversions. 



88 spurgeon's gold. 

We give checks which are really nothing but pieces of 
paper made valuable by a man's name ; and in the heaviest 
transactions of all, millions change from hand to hand with- 
out a coin being seen, the whole depending upon the honor 
and worth of those who sign their hands. What then? 
Shall not the Lord be trusted ? Ay, with our whole being 
and destiny. 

The encouragements of Christian communion are exceed- 
ingly great and the loss of them is very bitter. 

I have known some very good people spoiled for practi- 
cal usefulness and spoiled as to being like the Lord Jesus 
Christ by their deeply-laid conviction that it was wicked to 
be glad. 

A person may happen to do you a good turn, but if you 
are sure that he did it by accident or with no more thought 
than that wherewith a passing stranger throws a penny to a 
beggar you are not impressed with gratitude ; but when the 
action of your friend is the result of earnest deliberation 
and you see that he acts in the tenderest regard to your 
welfare you are far more thankful. Traces of anxiety to do 
you good are very pleasant. 

A little word from a friend will pain you much more than 
a fierce slander from an enemy. 

Horses are almost as hard to judge of as men's hearts; 
the oldest hands are taken in. 

One of the nearest approaches to death is to be without 
thought. 

Correcting for the press is work which has to be done 
with great care, since thousands of copies will be faulty if 
the proof-sheet be not as it should be. So should the min- 
ister of a congregation be seriously earnest to be right, be- 
cause his people will imitate him. Like priest, like people; 
the sheep will follow the shepherd. 

I should like those who think the salvation of souls from 
sin to be easy to try to convert one person. 

Each day there is a judgment which, in God's apprehen- 
sion, puts some upon the right hand with the " Come, ye 
blessed," and others upon the left hand with the " Depart, 
ye cursed." 



spurgeon's gold. 89 

Do not spin theories in your excited brains and vow that 
you will do this desperate thing and the other. The prob- 
ability is that you are not seeking the glory of the Lord, 
but you are wanting notoriety for yourself. You are aim- 
ing at supreme devotion that you may become a distinguished 
person, and that people may talk about your superior saint- 
ship. 

I fear that a terrible doom awaits those who go after the 
fashionable falsehoods of the day. 

Eighteen pence has set up many a peddler in business, 
and he has turned it over till he has kept his carriage. 

Great thoughts of self and great grace never go together. 

The bee is our example, for she builds a house, but fetches 
all the material from abroad, and it is from the flowers of 
the garden and not from herself that she procures the honey 
with which she stores her cells. True believers get all the 
substance and sweetness of their hopes from the flowers of 
the promises, and dare not live upon themselves or any- 
thing that they can do or be. 

Sin must be within us naturally, since the best training 
does not prevent it. 

If one Christian man is right in never joining a Christian 
church, then all other Christian men would be right in not 
doing so, and there would be no visible Christian church. 

Many very decent people are not self-contained, but are 
dependent upon the assistance of others. They are like the 
houses which our London builders run up so quickly in long 
rows ; if they did not help to keep each other up they would 
all tumble down at once, for no one of them could stand 
alone. How much there is of joint-stock-company religion, 
wherein hypocrites and formalists keep each other in coun- 
tenance. 

I have seen the noblest character where the position was 
unfavorable. 

Expect to get half of what you earn, a quarter of what is 
your due, and none of what you have lent, and you will be 
near the mark. 

Better be dim gold than shining brass. 



\ 



90 spurgeon's gold. 

When we meet with persons of little substance but of con^ 
siderabie kindling power, let us put them together, like 
matches and splinters of wood, for the commencement of 
an enterprise, and when we find others to be like heavy old 
logs, let us put them to use when the flame has taken good 
hold, for if they once get thoroughly alight they will sustain 
the fire long after the straw and the shavings have passed 
away. 

Have I not heard people say, "It was so kind and so 
thoughtful of him ! ' : Do you not notice that men value 
kindly thought and set great store by tender consideration. 

All men are sinners ; to most men, however, sin appears 
to be a fashion of the times, a necessity of nature, a folly 
of youth, or an infirmity of age, which a slight apology will 
suffice to remove. 

I say that this dying thief leads the van in the matter of 
faith, for what he saw of the circumstances of the Saviour 
was calculated to contradict rather than help his confidence. 
What he saw was to his hindrance rather than to his help, 
for he saw our Lord in the very extremity of agony and 
death, and yet he believed in Him as the King shortly to 
come into His kingdom. 

Presence of mind is invaluable, and the best way to se- 
cure presence of mind is to believe in the presence of God. 

God save us all from wives who are angels in the streets, 
saints in the church, and devils at home. 

To lose sensitiveness of conscience is to lose the excellence 
of our being. 

Brambles certainly have a fine time of it, and grow after 
their own pleasure. We have seen their long shoots reach- 
ing far and wide, and no knife has threatened them as they 
luxuriated upon the commons and waste lands. The poor 
vine is cut down so closely that little remains of it but bare 
stems. Yet, when clearing-time comes, and the brambles 
are heaped for their burning, who would not rather be the 
vine. 

How many hearts mightest thou have won for thy Lord 
if thine own heart had been fuller of love, if thine own soul 
had been more on fire ! 



SPURGEON S GOLD. 91 

> 

Nobody speaks so sternly against sin as Jesus and those 
who believe His gospel; but yet it forever stands true, 
"This man receiveth sinners." 

There is a passage in the Psalms which makes the Lord do 
for us what one would have thought we could have done for 
ourselves — "He maketh me to lie down in green pastures." 
Surely, if a sheep can do nothing else it can lie down. Yet, 
to lie down is the very hardest thing for God's sheep to do. 
It is here that the full power of the rest-giving Christ has to 
come in to make our fretful, worrying, doubtful natures lie 
down and rest. 

When the Spirit of God works with your persuasions your 
convert will keep His pledge. 

The thought that we may ourselves be one day under the 
window should make us careful when we are throwing out 
our dirty water. 

The Gospel, the whole Gospel, and nothing but the 
Gospel, must be our religion or we are lost men. 

No one fights with a statue, but living soldiers are often in 
the wars ; living Christians are sure to be assailed in one way 
or another, Let us therefore for once gather figs of thistles, 
and find comfortable fruit upon the thorns and briers of per- 
secution. The world is no fool; it would not be so fierce 
against us if it did not see something about us contrary to 
itself; its enmity, therefore, is part evidence that we are the 
children of God. 

Every man should labor by precept and example to put 
down intemperance. 

If a church labors to keep the ordinances as they were 
delivered, and endeavors to follow in the track of Christ's 
teaching and example, it may hope to receive the divine 
blessing. 

How many who only meant to go a little from the old ways 
of truth have gone too far aside even for themselves ! Truly, 
my speculative friend, "Thy rowers have brought thee into 
great waters." I am not intending to follow you. You 
are so wise that I am satisfied to be a fool, because I would 
wish to be the reverse of what you are. 



92 spurgeon's gold. 

You little know what a tyrant he serves who lives as he 
lists. 

"Why," says one, "I think John would get a new wife 
if he were left a widower." Well, and what if he did; 
how could he better show that he was happy with his first? 
I declare I would not say, as some do, that they married to 
have some one to look after the children ; I should marry 
to have some one to look after myself. 

If we indulge a sin we invite a sorrow. 

Stagnation in business, pressure for money, and the temp- 
tation to speculate fetch down many rotten Christians. 
The fashion of the world, the luxuries of life, and the habits 
of wealthy society also shake off others from their visible 
profession. 

To believe in the notion of a God is one thing, but to be- 
lieve God is quite another matter. 

If men did but more carefully watch their thoughts they 
would not so readily fall into evil habits; but men first in- 
dulge the thought of evil and then the imagination of evil. 

When we shall rise again from the dead we shall remem- 
ber the past. Do you not notice how the risen Saviour 
says, " These are the words which I spake unto you while I 
was yet with you. ' ' He had not forgotten His former state. 
It is rather a small subject, and probably we shall far more 
delight to dwell on the labors of our Redeemer's hands and 
feet ; but still we shall remember all the way whereby the 
Lord our God led us, and we shall talk to one another con- 
cerning it. In heaven we shall remember our happy Sab- 
baths here below, when our hearts burned within us while 
Jesus himself drew near. 

Well may we be a nation of beggars if we are a nation 
of drinkers. 

Eggs are eggs, but some are rotten ; and so hopes are 
hopes, but many of them are delusions. Hopes are like 
women, there is a touch of angel about them all — but there 
are two sorts. 

There is never a pause in our progress toward eternity. 



spurgeon's gold. 93 

Till Jesus communed with me I did not know that I could 
be so happy. I heard more birds singing in my soul than I 
ever dreamed could have dwelt within me. Never had my 
sad soul imagined that human life was half as capable of 
divine bliss or earth within a thousand leagues so near to 
heaven. 

Let us despise all pride of birth, rank, or wealth ; there- 
fore speak no more so exceedingly proudly. It is madness 
for dying men to boast. 

Heaven on earth is abounding love to Jesus. This is the 
first and last of true delight — to love Him who is the first 
and the last. To love Jesus is another name for paradise. 

To me it is a solemn memory that I professed my faith 
openly in baptism. Vividly do I recall the scene. It was 
the third of May, and the weather was cold because of a 
keen wind. I see the broad river, and the crowds which 
lined the banks, and the company upon the ferry-boat. 
The word of the Lord was preached by a man of God who 
is now gone home ; and when he had so done, he went down 
into the water, and we followed him, and he baptized us. 
I remember how, after being the slave of timidity, I rose 
from the liquid grave quickened into holy courage by that 
one act of decision, consecrated henceforth to bear a life- 
long testimony. By an avowed death to the world I pro- 
fessed my desire henceforth to live with Jesus, for Jesus, 
and like Jesus. 

We can be good workers for the Lord and successful fruit- 
bearers for his glory without having the pick of places. 

Show me a loving husband, a worthy wife, and good chil- 
dren, and no pair of horses that ever flew along the road could 
take me in a year where I could see a more pleasing sight. 

The new birth has disqualified us for contentment with 
the world. 

We cannot think of our sin without grieving, and the more 
sure we are that it is forgiven, the more sorry we are that 
ever it was committed. 

It is the old-fashioned, quiet, personal work which is ef- 
fectual. If we get to think that everything must be big to 
be good, we shall get into a sorry state of mind. 



94 spurgeon's gold. 

It is a sad thing for any sort of people when Jesus can say 
of them, "Verily, I say unto you, they have their reward.' ' 
They cannot expect to be paid twice, and as their account 
is discharged in full, what have they to look for ? 

I used, as a youth, sometimes to think that I was as good 
as other lads, and perhaps I was, for I had not fallen into 
the grosser vices. I fancied that if anybody was saved by 
a moral life, I might be. But oh, when God lifted the veil 
of my nature, and I saw what my heart really was, I sang 
to another tune. I had been down into the cellar of my 
heart a great many times in the dark, and it seemed pretty 
fair ; but when the Holy Spirit opened the shutters and let 
in the light, what loathsome abomination I saw there. My 
life, too, no longer appeared to be the goodly thing I had 
imagined it. Ah ! no, my comeliness was turned into cor- 
ruption. 

Our Lord is grieved for us when he sees us fall so low that, 
instead of being like Himself, we are not even like ourselves. 

The 'squire can be heard for half a mile if he only whis- 
pers, but Widow Needy is not heard across the park railings, 
let her call as she may. 

With difficulty can a man prevent the world's influencing 
him for evil. 

We sometimes think too exclusively of salvation as having 
reference to the world to come ; but it has an urgent, all- 
important reference to this present state. 

The Lord has some of His children whose heads are in a 
very queer state ; and if He first puts their hearts right He 
will afterward put their heads right. 

Here is a little child picked from the gutter ; it is starved, 
unclothed, unwashed, and sickening to death. What does 
it want? Well, it would take me a long time to write out 
a list of all its wants. It needs washing, clothing, warming, 
feeding, nursing, loving — no, I will not attempt to complete 
the catalogue, but I will tell you all in a word : this little 
child wants its mother. If it finds a loving and capable 
mother, it has all that it needs at once. Every lost soul of 
man needs a thousand things ; but no soul needs more than 
it will find in God. 



SPURGEON S GOLD. 95 

It is not uncharitable to warn men against poisonous adul- 
terations of their food or invasions of their rights ; and 
surely it cannot be more uncharitable to put them upon their 
guard against that which will poison or rob their souls. 

Choicest of all forms of power — the power of prayer. 

Cobblers have turned their lapstones into gold. 

The price of love is love. 

If called in poverty to sing bass, blessed is he who sings 
so as to please the ear of God ; he shall be fully as accepted 
as his neighbor who exalts his voice upon a higher key. So 
long as the music of his life is true to the score of duty, no 
man will be censured because his notes were not so strong, 
or high, or many as those of another in the company. 

The motive-power of action to a believing man lies hard 
by the realization that God, for Christ's sake, hath forgiven 
his iniquities. 

Live so that you need not change your mode of living, 
even if your sudden departure were immediately predicted 
to you. When you so live you will look upon death without 
fear. 

Sudden conversions have not ceased. I knew a man, a sin- 
gular person, but a sincere Christian, who, in his early days, 
never thought of going to any place of worship. One Sun- 
day morning he set out to visit a comrade, intending to 
conclude a bargain which, had been talked over the day be- 
fore, about a pair of ducks. He stepped into the meeting- 
house because it came on to rain, and there he found what he 
had never sought. He never bought that pair of ducks; he 
forgot them, as the woman of Samaria forgot her water-pot. 
The Lord met with him there and then, and he beheld his 
Saviour. 

It is down in your diary in black and white that His mercy 
endureth forever. 

Thousands ruin themselves by idle expectations. 

A man may dream that he is among the stars, and may 
suddenly wake to find that he has battered his face against 
the post of his bed ; dreaming, doting, and theorizing are 
poor substitutes for "real" experience of divine things. 



96 spurgeon's gold. 

It is with the transgressor as with the falling stone, the 
further he falls the faster he falls. 

Our hope is that we shall be approved of Him, and shall 
hear Him say: "Well done, good and faithful servant." 

A man who does not know Christ is a wretched man; a 
man who has never been renewed in heart, who lives in sin 
and loves it, is a pitiable being, a lost soul over whom angels 
might weep. 

As for myself, I know that I was born in sin, and I know 
that in me — that is, in my flesh — there dwelleth no good 
thing. I know also that I once tried to purge and cleanse 
my own heart, and labored at it, I believe, as honestly as 
any person that lived. I went about to seek a righteousness 
of my own, and I endeavored to get quit of sin \ but my 
failure was complete. I do not advise any other person to 
try self-healing. It brought me to despair ; it drove me al- 
most to the loss of reason. Therefore speak I of my own 
experience; and, taught by my own failure, I cannot urge 
any man to seek cleansing by his' own doings or efforts, but 
I urge him to accept that cleansing which God has promised 
in the covenant of grace. 

Some trumpets are so stuffed with self that God cannot 
blow through them. 

If I had no home the world would be a big prison to me. 

The Lord himself teaches us to judge what our Heavenly 
Father will do for us by that which we would do for our 
children. 

Secret reservoirs, far up in the mountains, supply the 
water-springs; and eternal deeps of boundless love in the 
everlasting hills supply the love-springs of the believer's 
soul. Is it not written, "All my fresh springs are in thee? " 

If men are not warned of the anger of God against in- 
iquity they will take license to riot in evil. 

We crave the world, we sigh for human approbation, we 
seek for ease and comfort, we desire above all things to in- 
dulge our pride with the vain notion of self-righteousness. 

It would seem that there is no worse abuse of a good thing 
than to abstain from its use. 



spurgeon's gold. 97 

Paul knew but little of the world, except that portion of it 
which bordered on the Mediterranean Sea ; the whole world 
then seemed to lie in a nutshell ; but now our discoverers and 
geographers, our steamboats and telegraphs, have brought a 
greater world close to our doors. We share with the sorrows 
of India ; we groan in the darkness of Africa \ the cries of 
China are at our doors, and Egypt's griefs are our own. In- 
crease of knowledge demands increase of prayer. 

He promised to come to die, and He kept His word; 
He now promises to come to reign, and be you sure that He 
will keep His tryst with His people. 

All the world will beat the man whom fortune buffets. 

A man had better have the prince for a friend than possess 
a thousand images of the king, his father, upon gold and sil- 
ver ; and so it is a happier thing for us to know that Christ 
is ours than to possess all other blessings, however much of 
God there may be about them. 

Our lives through various scenes are drawn and vexed with 
petty provocations. Paltry annoyances are the bane of our 
peace. 

In vain you boast the enlightenment of this nineteenth 
century; the nineteenth century is not one whit more en- 
lightened as to the depravity of human nature than the first 
century. 

The world is not going to darken into an eternal night ; 
the morning cometh as well as the night, and though sin 
and corruption abound, and the love of many waxeth cold, 
these are but the tokens of His near advent who said that 
it would be so before His appearing. The right with the 
might and the might with the right shall be ; as surely as 
God lives, it shall be so. We are not fighting a losing battle. 
The Lord must triumph. 

It is a pity to take much notice of what some sufferers 
say, for they will be sorry for it soon. 

They who join their love in God above, who pray to love 
and love to pray, will find that love and joy will never cloy. 

To be holy and gracious needs many a struggle, many a 
tear. 

7s 



98 spurgeon's gold. 

All the sea outside a ship cannot do it damage till the 
water enters within and fills the hold. Hence, it is clear, 
our greatest danger is from within. All the devils in hell 
and tempters on earth could do us no injury if there were 
no corruption in our nature. 

If there is one who is servant to that black master I 
would recommend him to run to Christ and not give his 
master five minutes' notice. 

He who protests against a self-righteous people, and an- 
gers them by showing that others whom they despised are 
saved while they themselves are being lost, will have need 
of a dauntless spirit. 

One of the commandments of the saints of misery is : 
"Draw down the blinds on a Sunday." Another is: 
"Never smile during a sermon ; it is wicked." A third 
precept is : " Never rest yourself, and be sure that you 
never let anybody else rest for an instant. Why should 
anybody be allowed a moment's quiet in a world so full of 
sin? Go through the world and impress people with the 
idea that it is an awful thing to live." 

The ideal Christian is one who has been made alive with 
a life which he lives for God. 

Some men can neither do without wives nor with them ; 
they are wretched alone in what is called single blessedness, 
and they make their homes miserable when they get married. 

Contentment is the crown jewel of a happy life. 

If we would please God we must watch every stroke and 
touch upon the canvas of our lives, and we may not think 
that we can lay it on with a trowel and yet succeed. We 
ought to live as miniature painters work, for they watch 
every line and tint. 

He that is truly great among men is tender, because he is 
great in heart as well as in brain and hand. 

Like Paul, have a strong desire to depart and to be with 
Christ, and yet be willing to wait if we can do service to our 
Lord and to His Church. 

Independence and a clear conscience are better with cold 
cabbage than slavery and sin with roast beef. 



spurgeon's gold. 99 

The officers were after our Lord, and He knew it. He 
could spy them out in the crowd, but He was not therefore 
in the least afraid or disconcerted. He reminds me of that 
minister who, when he was about to preach, was stopped by 
a soldier, who held a pistol at his head and threatened that 
if he spake he would kill him. "Soldier," said he, "do 
your duty ; I shall do mine ; ' ' and he went on with his 
preaching. The Saviour, without saying as much in words, 
said so by His actions. 

Friendship is one of the sweetest joys of life ; many spirits 
might have failed beneath the bitterness of trial if they had 
not found a friend. 

Those who disdain to live for God will live for their own 
bellies. 

A man's handwriting binds him. Now, we may be sure 
that the Lord will never deny his own writing nor run back 
from a bond given under his own hand and seal. Every 
promise of Scripture is a writing of God, which may be 
pleaded before Him with this reasonable request: "Do as 
Thou hast said. ' ' 

No man hears his pastor preach without deriving some 
benefit from him, if he has earnestly prayed for him. 

Cast your eye over every land, glance from the pole to 
the equator, and along to the other pole, and see if this be 
not the universal law, that man must be dissolved in death. 

Still further to confirm the faith of the disciples, and to 
show them that their Lord had a real body, and not the 
mere form of one, He gave them evidence which appealed 
to their common sense. He said, "Have ye any meat? 
And they gave Him a piece of broiled fish, and of an honey- 
comb. And He took it, and did eat before them." This 
was an exceedingly convincing proof of his unquestionable 
resurrection. In very deed and fact, and not in vision»and 
phantom, the man who had died upon the cross stood among 
them. 

Not much good comes of picking holes in other men's 
characters, and yet many spend hours in that unprofitable 
occupation. 

Success is the crucible of character. 



100 spurgeon's gold. 

When home is ruled according to God's word, angels 
might be asked to stay a night with us, and they would not 
find themselves out of their element. 

If we look for Christ to come we shall keep our eyes heaven- 
ward and our minds occupied with the country from which 
He cometh. If we mind earthly things it will be evidence 
that the coming of the Lord has no power over us. 

Dear young fellow, you may be turned out of your situa- 
tion, but the Lord will turn the curse into a blessing. 

I believe that great holiness sets us free from the love of 
this world and makes us ready to depart. By great holi- 
ness I mean great horror of sin and great longing after 
perfect purity. 

The Church is the bride of Christ, and for a bride to fail 
in love is to fail in all things. It is idle for the wife to say 
that she is obedient, and so forth ; if love to her husband 
has evaporated, her wifely duty cannot be fulfilled ; she has 
lost the very life and soul of the marriage state. So, my 
brethren, this is a most important matter, our love to Christ, 
because it touches the very heart of that communion with 
Him which is the crown and essence of our spiritual life. 
As a church, we must love Jesus or else we have lost our 
reason for existence. Lose love, lose all. Leave our first 
love, we have left strength and peace and joy and holiness. 

No character like that of Jesus is to be seen in history — 
nay, not even in romance. 

If there's one bad shilling taken at the grocer's all the 
neighbors hear of it, but of the hundreds of good ones re- 
port says nothing. 

The gentleness of Christ is a choice qualification for a 
pastor. 

It is a blessed thing to think of heaven at the end ; but it 
is an almost equally blessed thing to think of God with us 
on the way. 

It is not necessary for a person's life for him to know 
where he was born ; yet I am glad that I know my birth- 
place, and I am happy to remember the humble spot. 



spurgeon's gold. 101 

The assaults of sceptics are a gain to believers, for they 
produce a clearing and opening up of the truth. Opposition 
directs attention to neglected doctrines, and heresy calls for 
orthodox replies, and so our defenses become stronger as 
our enemies become more furious. 

God has many very naughty children; they fall into quar- 
rels with their Heavenly Father. "Ever since that dear 
child died," says one, "I have never felt the same toward 
God."- "Ever since my mother was taken away," cries 
another, "I have always felt that I could not trust God as 
I used to do." This is shocking talk. Have done with it. 
If you quarrel with God, He will say to you, "It is hard 
for thee to kick against the pricks." There is no happi- 
ness but in complete submission. Yield, and all will end 
well ; but if you stand out against the Most High, it is not 
God's rod that makes you smart; it is a rod of your own 
making. End this warfare by saying, "It is the Lord; let 
Him do what seemeth to Him good." Do not say, "He 
blessed me up to a certain point, and then He changed His 
hand." This is a most slanderous falsehood. 

Depend upon it, those useful workers whom you so much 
envy have their private griefs, which minister to their use- 
fulness or keep them humble under their success. 

No man's lot is fully known till he is dead; change of 
fortune is the lot of life. 

We are more forcible in communicating sin than virtue. 

Often does it happen that the boaster is tripped up by the 
enemy whom he thought to be dead and buried, while the 
watchful, careful Christian is preserved in the midst of the 
fiercest temptations and enabled to maintain his integrity. 

The devil's work is never done; it is undone again in five 
minutes when the grace of God is at work. 

The possibilities of a man are stupendous. God with a 
man, nothing is impossible to that man. Give us not the 
power of gold, or rank, or eloquence, or wisdom, but give 
us a man. 

There is more satisfaction in Christ's worst things than 
in sin's best things. 



102 spurgeon's gold. 

I have preached His Gospel now for many years, but I 
never met with a sinner yet that Christ refused to cleanse 
when he came to Him. I never knew of a single case of a 
man who trusted Jesus, and asked to be forgiven, confess- 
ing his sin and forsaking it, who was cast out. I say I never 
met with one man whom Jesus refused ; nor shall I ever do 
so. I have spoken with harlots whom He has restored to 
purity, and drunkards whom he has delivered from their 
evil habit, and with men guilty of foul sins who have be- 
come pure and chaste through the grace of our Lord Jesus. 
They have always told me the same story — "I sought the 
Lord, and He heard me; He hath washed me in His blood 
and I am whiter than snow. ' ' 

How many thousands have there been of true helpmeets, 
worth far more than their weight in gold ! There is only 
one Job's wife mentioned in the Bible and one Jezebel, but 
there are no end of Sarahs and Rebekahs. 

If there be no growth, it may be, nay, surely it must be, 
that you are not a child born into the family of God, but a 
pretty picture, which may adorn a room, but which cannot 
perform any of the actions of life. 

As I conceive the face of Christ, it was very different from 
anything that any painter has yet been able to place upon 
his canvas. 

That man who feels a daily striving after deliverance from 
evil, who is panting, and pining, and longing, and agoniz- 
ing to become holy even as God is holy, he is the justified 
man. 

Surely, if at any period in our lives we should consider 
our latter end it is when the frail tent of our body begins 
to tremble because the cords are loosened and the curtain 
is rent. It is the general custom with sick people to talk 
about "getting well," and those who visit them, even when 
they are gracious people, will see the tokens of death upon 
them, and yet will speak as if they were hopeful of their 
recovery. I remember a father asking me when I prayed 
with a consumptive girl to be sure not to mention death. 
In such cases it would be far more sensible for the sick man 
to turn his thoughts towards eternity, and stand prepared 
for the great change. 



spurgeon's gold. 103 

When a meteor darts across the sky children say that a 
star has fallen, but it is not so. So, too, we hear men say 
that a Christian has fallen from grace, a saint has become 
an apostate. This also is an error. The saints are in their 
places still, for it is written, "the righteous shall hold on 
his way \ ' ' those who have fallen were meteors, not stars ; 
professors, but not genuine possessors of the heavenly light. 
The seven stars are in a hand out of which nothing falls : 
" All the saints are in thy hand. ' ' Jesus says, ' ' He that be- 
lieveth in me hath everlasting life, ' ' and therefore we are 
sure that they will not die. 

Friends ever have an ear for friends. 

Beware of those who come from the town of Deceit. 

It is no time for boasting while we are still in the enemy's 
country. 

The race forgets its masters but it remembers its friends. 

It is easier to get a sinner out of his sin than a self- 
righteous man out of his self-righteousness. 

Nobody will err about the way to God if he really resolves 
to follow that way. The Spirit of God will guide those 
whose hearts are set upon coming to God. 

I asked a question some years ago of a person whom I be- 
lieved to be one of the most covetous individuals in my ac- 
quaintance, and I received from him a singular reply. I 
said: "How was it that St. Francis de Sales, who was an 
eminent confessor, to whom persons went in the Romish 
Church to confess their sins, found that persons confessed to 
him in private all sorts of horrible sins,- such as adultery, 
drunkenness, and murder, but never had one person con- 
fessed the sin of covetousness ? " I asked this friend 
whether he could tell me why it was, and he made me this 
answer, which certainly did take me rather aback. He 
said : "I suppose it is because the sin is so extremely rare" 
Blind soul ! I told him that, on the other hand, I feared 
the sin was so very common that people did not know when 
they were covetous, and that the man who was most covet- 
ous of all was the last person to suspect himself of it. 

The worst foes of the truth are not infidels, but false pro- 
fessors. 



104 spurgeon's gold. 

Economy is a fine thing, and makes nine pence go further 
than a shilling. 

Where avarice is the absolute master, the man is a miser. 

We have heard persons talk of the days of childhood as 
the happiest in mortal life, but we do not agree with them ; 
the sorrows of childhood take a very intense possession of 
the little ones, and in their grief everything seems lost, 
whereas the full-grown mind is divided in sorrow, and other 
considerations come in to temper the wind of trouble. 

The service of the world is much sterner, much more 
exacting, much more wearisome, than the service of the 
Lord Jesus Christ. 

The most horrible thing in the world is for a man no 
longer to be able to speak with his Maker, nor his Maker to 
look favorably upon him. 

In heaven the saints will be nearer to Christ than the 
apostles were when they sat at the table with Him or heard 
Him pray. That was a nearness which might consist only 
in place, and their minds might still be, as they often were, 
far away from Him ; but up in heaven we shall be one with 
Him in sympathy, in spirit, in conscious fellowship. 

Power to do good involves the duty of doing good. 

When the devil sees hypocrites at their little game it must 
be as good as a play to him ; he tempts genuine Christians, 
but he lets these alone, because he is sure of them. 

Old men are not always wise men. 

Satan first acts as deceiver and then as accuser. While 
men can be made to suck down sin he will make it sweet 
in their mouths ; but when the poison is down he makes it 
bitter in their bowels. At the first he tells them that there 
is no punishment, and by and by that there is no mercy. 

I always have a warm side toward odd, eccentric, out-of- 
the-way people, because I am one myself — at least, so I am 
often said to be. 

We cannot all of us praise God in the family by joining 
in song, because we are not all able to raise a tune, but it 
would be well if we could. 



spurgeon's gold. 105 

» 
By your anxious care you may seek to detain them ; you 
may sit about their bed and nurse them both night and day, 
but they must quit these dark abodes when Jesus gives the 
signal. You may clutch them with affectionate eagerness, 
and even cry in despair, "They shall not go, we cannot 
bear to part with them ; ' ' but go they must when Jesus calls. 

Friendship, if it exists, will breed mutual delight. 

I've known men who open their mouths like barn doors 
in boasting what they would do z/*they were in somebody's 
else shoes. 

Every saint taken home brings the world so much nearer 
its end. 

Few knit out of the many flowers which make promise 
of apples. It has ever been so, and he is an unwise man 
who dreams that his trees will be exempted from the uni- 
versal law. The same rule holds good in all earthly mat- 
ters. Out of many hopeful results which we look for from 
our plans and labors, some must fail us. 

Snails leave their slime behind them, and so do vain 
thoughts. 

Let us make worldlings know the fragrance of our joyous 
hope ; especially let us tell those who seem most likely to 
laugh at us, for we have learned by experience that some 
of these are most likely to be impressed. 

This Bible is our treasure. We prize each leaf of it. Let 
us bind it in the best fashion, in the best morocco of a clear, 
intelligent faith ; then let us put a golden clasp upon it, and 
gild its edges by a life of love, and truth, and purity, and 
zeal. Thus shall we commend the volume to those who have 
never looked within its pages. 

Either give up sin or give up hope. 

A well-matched couple carry a joyful life between them. 
They multiply their joys by snaring them, and lessen their 
troubles by dividing them; this is fine arithmetic. 

As a lamp is all the more valued when the night is dark, 
so is the Gospel all the more precious when men see their 
misery without it. 



106 spurgeon's gold. 

This we know by experience : Sweet is the music of the 
English tongue when heard amid the clatter of foreign 
speech. We feel our heart warmed at the sight of a costume 
which we can recognize as covering a true Briton. Such 
are the feelings of a Christian when he falls in with a true 
believer, and by his speech and conduct knows him to be a 
citizen of heaven. 

A frightened sinner is a sinner still. 

If you and I felt our Lord's anxiety to be serving God 
and winning souls, we should find refreshment in the service 
itself, even as He did. 

For that Revised Version I have but little care, as a gen- 
eral rule, holding it to be by no means an improvement 
upon our common Authorized Version. It is a useful thing 
to have it for private reference, but I trust it will never be 
regarded as the standard English translation of the New 
Testament. The Revised Version of the Old Testament is 
so excellent that I am half afraid it may carry the Revised 
New Testament upon its shoulders into general use. I sin- 
cerely hope that this may not be the case, for the result 
would be a decided loss. 

The Gospel is that God hath mercy upon the guilty and 
undeserving. 

The dog wags his tail till he gets the bone, and then he 
snaps and bites at the man who fed him. 

Perseverance in prayer is necessary to prevalence in 
prayer. 

See how men throw overboard the lading of the ship when 
it becomes a question of saving their lives. Reason teaches 
them that the less precious must go first ; they do not throw 
over first their gold and then their corn, neither do they 
lose their lives to save their ingots. So let us, above all 
things, care for our souls and their eternal interests. 

May our life work close as sets the sun, looking greater 
when he sinks into the west than when he shines at full me- 
ridian height ! 

No doubt by praying we learn to pray, and the more we 
pray the oftener we can pray, and the better we can pray. 



spurgeon's gold. 107 

Two men alone entered the next world without seeing 
death, but those two exceptions prove the rule. Another 
great exception is yet to come, which I w T ould never over- 
look. Peradventure the Lord Jesus Christ may personally 
come before we see death, and when He cometh we that are 
alive and remain shall not fall asleep ; but even then ' ' We 
shall all be changed in a moment, in the twinkling of an 
eye, at the last trump; for the dead shall be raised incor- 
ruptible, and we shall be changed." 

Satan assails us through our fellows. 

Fine dressing makes a great hole in poor people's means. 

God has laid no embargo upon rejoicing; He puts no re- 
striction upon happiness. Do believe it that you are per- 
mitted to be happy. 

A believer may be truly alive unto God, though by his 
carelessness he has lost all the wealth of the spiritual life, 
and has fallen into soul poverty. Such a man should not 
despair, but with deep humiliation he should begin again. 
A tradesman who has failed will take to a humble calling to 
earn his bread, and so should a Christian who has broken 
down in his spiritual estate take a lowly position, and with 
all diligence labor to glorify the Lord better than before. 

Trust in self is a disloyal attempt upon the crown rights 
of the Redeemer. All those doings and willings and feel- 
ings are a setting up of self-salvation. 

I have on several occasions felt everything like fear of 
dying taken from me simply by the process of weariness ; 
for. I could not wish to live any longer in such pain as I 
then endured. 

Despite our ignorance, nothing can go wrong while the 
Lord in infinite knowledge ruleth over all. The child play- 
ing on the deck does not understand the tremendous engine 
whose beat is the throbbing heart of the stately Atlantic liner, 
and yet all is safe; for the engineer, the captain, and the 
pilot are in their places and well know w T hat is being done. 
Let not the child trouble itself about things too great for it. 

Warm-hearted saints keep each other warm. 

Lewd words soon lead to foul deeds. 



108 spurgeon's gold. 

A great deal of water can be got from a small pipe if the 
bucket is always there to catch it. 

In the world to come the ceaseless activity of conscience 
will be the torture of hell. Rendered sensitive by the re- 
moval of hardening influences, the lost soul will find mem- 
ory accusing and conscience condemning forever, and no 
advocate at hand to suggest a defense. A man had better 
be shut up with a bear robbed of her whelps than live 
with an accusing conscience. No racks or fires can equal 
the misery of being consciously guilty and seeing no way 
of escape from sin. 

In dark mines men find bright jewels, and so from our 
worst troubles come our best blessings. 

Practical doing is better than loud boasting. 

There is a joy in achieving a great purpose, even when it 
is only by sorrow that our design is wrought out. 

The way to make men better is not to be always censur- 
ing them, but to love them better. 

We may speak of sleeplessness very- lightly, but among 
afflictions it is one of the worst that can happen to men. 

To this life of yours and mine there can be no postscript. 
We must do our work now or never. 

The further a man goes in lust and iniquity the more dead 
he becomes to purity and holiness ; he loses the power to ap- 
preciate the beauties of virtue or to be disgusted with the 
abominations of vice. 

I hardly know of a more conscious union between a man 
and Christ than that which is effected when in sinking times 
the grip of the crucified hand is felt as our sole rescue from 
death. 

Before we rebuke another we must consider and take heed 
that we are not guilty of the same thing, for he who cleanses 
a blot with inky fingers makes it worse. 

Be half a Christian and you shall have enough religion to 
make you miserable; be wholly a Christian and your joy 
shall be full. 



spurgeon's gold. 109 

Blessed is that man who never deliberates, because his 
mind is made up rather to ' ' suffer affliction with the people 
of God than to enjoy the pleasures of sin for a season." 

I have noticed old people whose memories have been 
sadly feeble. I knew one who forgot his children. But I 
never knew an old saint yet who forgot the name of the 
Saviour or failed to remember His love. 

Certain things that you and I may do may appear right, 
and yet we may need to be chidden out of them into some- 
thing better; they may be right in themselves, but not ap- 
propriate for the occasion, not seasonable, nor expedient. 

At this present moment there is a place in heaven for me 
that nobody can ever fill but my own self; and Jesus has 
gone before, not only to prepare it, but to prepare it for 
me. There is a crown that no head but mine can ever wear 
and a song that no tongue but mine can ever sing, and I 
shall soon cast my crown at Jesus' feet and chant before Him 
my hallelujahs. That is true of every believer. 

The sermon that only gets as far as the ear is like a din- 
ner eaten in a dream. 

Sin has this mischief about it, that it strikes a man with 
spiritual paralysis. 

He will save even you, though you are as bad as you well 
can be. 

If I were to try and tell all the things that make Chris- 
tians glad, even here below, I should have to make an endless 
catalogue. 

He seeth not as man seeth, with a mere gaze of cold no- 
tice; but His heart goes with his eye. 

I find it forbidden in Scripture for any man to call his 
brother " fool," but I do not find him forbidden to call him- 
self so. 

No pace is too swift for God to come to the deliverance 
of His people. He is slow to anger, but He is swift in 
mercy. 

Truth is like those crystals which, when split up into the 
smallest possible fragments, still retain their natural form. 



110 spurgeon's gold. 

" The Man of Joys ! " I venture thus to name the Christ 
of God. We do not often enough meditate upon the hap- 
piness of the Lord Jesus Christ. 

Surely it ill becomes us to waste a penny, an hour, or an 
opportunity. Let us be severely economical for the Lord 
our God. 

Anger does a man more hurt than that which made him 
angry. It opens his mouth and shuts his eyes and fires his 
heart and drowns his sense and makes his wisdom folly. 

Those who preach not the atonement exhibit a dumb and 
dummy gospel ; a mouth it hath and speaketh not ; they 
that make it are like unto their idol. 

I cannot imagine a fuller present reward than complete 
rest from all anxiety and calm confidence in a Providence 
which can never fail. 

However much the Church may have been increased by 
a true revival, God has never as yet done according to the 
fullness of His ability in the Church; even Pentecost was 
but the first-fruits. 

If we greatly grow in faith it will be the source of other 
growths; for as faith increases, love, patience, and every 
other virtue will flourish. 

I have known many in this world very loving and affec- 
tionate, but they have not been faithful ; on the other hand, 
I have known men to be sternly honest and truthful, but 
they have not been gentle and kind ; but in the Lord Jesus 
Christ there is no defect either way. 

Some things want doing gently, and telling a man of his 
faults is one of them. 

Blessed are they who do what they should do. 

Sin multiplies itself very rapidly. 

Some are hindered in their usefulness by their great dig- 
nity. 

Sin is in itself an unmitigated evil, a root which beareth 
wormwood. 

Where spiritual life is weak it should be nurtured with 
affectionate care. 



spurgeon's gold. Ill 

» 

God's errands are so important that we must not delay in 
their performance. 

Silent acts of love have musical voices in the ear of Jesus. 

It is not the box that makes the jewel, nor the place that 
makes the man. 

Deep as were His griefs, we may reckon Jesus of Nazareth 
among the happiest of men. 

Prayer is the autograph of the Holy Ghost upon the re- 
newed heart. 

I am always afraid of the tail end of a habit. A man 
who is always in debt will never be cured till he has paid 
the last sixpence. 

Our circumstances compel us to think of lower objects, 
but Ave need divine help to abide in communion with the 
higher matters. 

As Peter's fish had the money in its mouth, so have sanc- 
tified trials spiritual riches for those who endure them gra- 
ciously. 

We should not know ourselves if we could see ourselves 
as we are to be when the Lord's purpose is accomplished 
upon us. 

Two little words are good for every Christian to learn and 
to practice — pray and stay. Waiting on the Lord implies 
both praying and staying. 

If there is but a step between you and death — if the Judge 
is at the door — go and wind up your little difficulties. You 
that have family quarrels, wipe them out. You that have 
any malice in your heart, turn it out. 

Trials are like a fire ; they burn up nothing in us but the 
dross, and they make the gold all the purer. Put down the 
testing process as a clear gain, and, instead of being sorry 
about it, count it all joy when you fall into divers trials, for 
this bestows upon you a proof of your faith. 

Prating does not make saints, or there would be plenty 
of them. 

A man that lives without prayer ought not to live. 



112 spurgeon's gold. 

Starve your soul and you will be wretched amid the 
dainties of a king's table. 

A true disciple is a follower; he is an imitator of his 
Master. 

There is as much real practice about right thinking as 
about right acting. 

We associate with His crucifixion much of sorrowful regret, 
but we derive from His birth at Bethlehem nothing but de- 
light. 

Do let us try with all our hearts so to look every man 
upon the things of others that no single seeking soul shall 
feel itself deserted. 

The terrible acts of the Lord are few, but no age is quite 
left without them, for the Lord liveth still, and He is ever- 
more the same. 

It is as easy to make an idol out of your own thoughts as 
it is for the Hindoo to make a god of the mud of the Ganges. 

The Lord will allow no service to remain unrecompensed ; 
and work done for the poor and needy shall win its wage, 
not of debt, but of grace. 

A man who cannot push on against wind and weather 
stands a poor chance in this world. 

The Lord's providence rules words as well as deeds, and 
makes men say the right words without their knowing why 
they say them. 

If you once hear the Gospel you can never be indifferent 
to it ) you must either be its friend or its foe, its disciple 
or its opposer. 

Prosperity softens and renders us unfit for more of itself, 
but adversity braces the soul and hardens it to patience. 

Prayer is the outcome of that sense of need which arises 
from the new life ; a man would not pray to God if he did 
not feel that he had urgent need of blessings which only the 
Lord can bestow. 

Though the dollar is not almighty, it ought to be used for 
the Almighty and not wasted in wicked extravagance. 



spurgeon's gold. 113 

» 

Afflictions by God's grace make us all-round men, de- 
veloping every spiritual faculty, and therefore they are our 
friends, our helpers, and should be welcomed with ' ' all joy. ' ' 

I call that man a fool who throws away jewels that he may 
gather pebbles, who casts away gold and silver that he may 
gather up mire and dirt. And what do they do who fling 
away heaven and eternal life for the sake of a transient joy, 
a momentary gain ? 

That which we do to display our own liberality is done 
unto self, and so is spoiled. 

There is something very beautiful about that which is 
done by new converts. 

The work of pressed men is never so much prized as that 
of happy volunteers. 

Christianity has a great uniting power ; it both discovers 
and creates relationships among the sons of men. 

Whatever brotherhood may be a sham, let the brother- 
hood of believers be the most real thing beneath the stars. 

It would be greatly to your gain if you never again in- 
dulged a shred of hope in your own works, and were forced 
to accept the grace of God. 

Darkness never begets light, filth never creates purity, hell 
never yields heaven, and depravity never produces grace. 

It has sometimes happened that the illustrious deed of 
one man has served to elevate a class or even a nation into 
honor. 

I believe that within a century it will be found impossible 
to make men believe that educated men were ever so de- 
graded as to accept the philosophy of the present hour. 

Do what you do right thoroughly, pray over it heartily, 
and leave the result to God. 

Works done out of love to Christ, and love to saints, and 
love to the poor, and love to. lost sinners are good works. 

In Jesus we do not see humanized Godhead, nor deified 
manhood ; but he is distinctly God and distinctly man, yet 
both of these are in one person, and must neither be con- 
founded nor severed. 

8s 



114 spurgeon's gold. 

If your conscience gives way for the sake of your own 
gain or pleasure, the world will think that it is a sham, and 
they will not be far from the mark. 

We are in a special degree God's workmanship, created to 
this end, that we may produce good works, and we are fitted 
to that end as much as a bird is fitted to fly or a worm is 
fitted for its purposes in the earth. 

Well may we be called brethren, for we are redeemed by 
one blood ; we are partakers of the same life ; we feed upon 
the same heavenly food ; we are united to the same living 
head ; we seek the same ends ; we love the same Father ; we 
are heirs of the same promises, and we shall dwell forever 
together in the same heaven. 

Out of evil comes good, through the great goodness of 
God. 

The life of Jesus Christ is great throughout. 

You cannot be saved in your sins ; you are to be saved 
from your sins. 

Those who prefer philosophy to Christ never knew Him. 

We remember much that we ought to forget, and we for- 
get much that we ought to remember. 

I count no man so loathsome that God may not look 
upon him in love. 

By faith children become little disciples, and by faith 
they go on to become more proficient. 

Singing is the language of joy, the special vehicle of 
praise, the chosen speech of heaven. 

Since sin was laid on Jesus, God's justice cannot lay it 
upon the believing sinner. The Lord will never punish 
twice the same offense. 

There may be, there is, grace in other men, but not as it is 
in Christ ; they have it as water flowing through a pipe, but 
He has it as water in its fountain and source. 

Many good people there are who have religious crazes ! 
They do nothing, but they have wonderful plans for doing 
everything in a jiffy. 



spurgeon's gold. 115 

Full often the most advantageous place for our manhood 
is that which is surrounded with splendid difficulties. 

It is well to have Christ's portrait hung up in every cham- 
ber of your soul ; I do not say of your house — that might 
lead to idolatry; but in every chamber of your mind and 
heart. 

Those who preach the cross of our Lord Jesus are the ter- 
ror of modern thinkers. In their heart of hearts they dread 
the preaching of the old-fashioned Gospel, and they hate 
what they dread. 

Those who follow after falsehood have a secret monitor 
within which tells them that theirs is a weak course, and 
that truth must and will prevail over them. Let them 
alone; the beating of their own hearts will scare them. 

I have heard a great deal about evolution and develop- 
ment, but I am afraid that if any one of us were to be de- 
veloped to our utmost, apart from the grace of God, we 
should come out worse than before the development began. 

We are not free from the worldliness which puts self first 
and God nowhere, else our various enterprises would be 
more abundantly supplied with the silver and the gold which 
are the Lord's, but which even professing Christians reserve 
for themselves. 

The less we do when we go mad the better for everybody, 
and the less we go mad the better for ourselves. 

Love is a master force, and he that feels its power will 
hate all evil. 

There is such a thing as spoiling what you would do by 
making so great a fuss before you do it. 

The Lord Jesus deserved to be served at the best rate 
and at the highest cost. 

The Church is injured in her efforts for the conversion 
of the world by the inconsistencies of certain of her mem- 
bers. 

Let us be silent before the Lord and judge His ways no 
longer, for in this judgment there is no benefit to ourselves 
or others. 



116 spurgeon's gold. 

The existence of God and the immortality of the soul 
lie at the basis of Old Testament teaching. 

We have seen very, very, very great little people, and 
very, very little great people who have given themselves 
mighty airs; but we have never seen any good come of 
their greatness. 

When a man is no longer afraid, but is prepared to wel- 
come whatever comes, because he sees in it the appointment 
of a loving Father, why, then he is in a happy state. 

A wise man will go to work in a sensible way, and will so 
give his money to the poor that he will be lending it to the 
Lord. No security can be better and no interest can be 
surer. The bank is open at all hours. It is the best sav- 
ings bank in the nation. 

The beginning of a clear sense of our own weakness is 
often the beginning of the display of the power of God. 

In opening a new business sanctify the venture with the 
supplications of godly friends, and in all fresh enterprises 
be guided of the Lord. 

Happy are we if we can while yet we live be coworkers 
together with Him, that when He cometh to His Kingdom 
we may be partakers of His glory. 

To know the truth and feel its power, and manifest its 
influence in your life, is the proof that you have grappled 
it to your soul as with hooks of steel. 

I am unable to frame an excuse for profane language ; it 
is needless, willful wickedness. Men talk so as to horrify 
us; they chill our blood with fear lest God should take them 
at their word, and all for nothing at all. 

Calm resignation does not come all at once; often long 
years of physical pain, or mental depression, or disappoint- 
ment in business, or multiplied bereavements are needed to 
bring the soul into full submission to the will of the Lord. 

Promising men are not great favorites if they are not 
performing men. 

They that serve God shall not have to complain of His 
deserting them. 



spurgeon's gold. . 117 

However good a man may be, he will not escape trial in 
the flesh. 

Men dream, and then assert that their visions are truth. 

The authority of Jesus stands to us in the stead of rea- 
soning. 

The world is a veritable Dead Sea upon a gigantic scale. 

Faith has brought us into the possession of an indefeas- 
ible salvation. 

The joy of religion lies in a hearty faith in it. 

It is foolish to try to live on past experience \ it is a very 
dangerous if not a fatal habit. 

Idle professor, if you would be diligent in serving your 
Lord life would be music to you. 

The young convert is an emigrant from the world, and 
has become, for Christ's sake, an alien. 

We incline to attach undue importance to matters which 
are proper and useful in their places, but which are by no 
means essential to salvation. 

Those who seek after the novelties of this conceited cen- 
tury seek to push their Lord from His place that a philoso- 
pher may fill His throne. 

If you ever allow yourself to be pleased by those who 
speak well of you, to that extent will you be capable of 
being grieved by those who speak ill of you. 

God sees everything as now. Nothing is past, nothing is 
future to Him. He sees things that are not as though they 
were, and the things that shall be as though they had been. 

The powers of darkness are not so strong as they seem to 
be. The subtlest infidels and heretics are only men. What 
is more, they are bad men ; and bad men at bottom are 
weak men. 

Whenever you find sickness in a house or death in a dark- 
ened chamber, seize the opportunity to speak for your Lord. 
Your voice for truth will be likely to be heard, for God 
Himself is speaking and men must hear Him whether they 
will or no. 



118 spurgeon's gold. 

Wisdom in a poor man is like a diamond set in lead, for 
none but good judges can discover its value. 

Lazy fellows ruin their trade and then say that bad trade 
ruined them. 

He that is out of order with God may well be out of 
order with himself. 

Those who dwell outside the palace of love know nothing 
about our secret ecstasies and raptures. 

The more God blesses you, the less you shall see of any 
adequate reason in yourself why you should be blest. 

The microscope reveals a world of marvels quite as sur- 
prising as that which is brought before us by the telescope. 

The moment the Lord Jesus Christ saves a soul He gives 
that soul strength for its appointed service. 

If there were no hereafter, the immediate peace and joy 
of trusting my God are an overflowing reward. 

Always have something in hand that is greater than your 
present capacity. Grow up to it, and when you have grown 
up to it, grow more. 

So you may be a Christian and be weak, timorous, and 
sad, but this is not desirable; it is better to be a happy, 
holy, vigorous, useful Christian. 

We think we can do what we are not called to, and if by 
chance the thing falls to our lot we do worse than those we 
blamed. 

We want a conversion which shall make us run in paral- 
lel lines with the God who has revealed Himself by His 
prophets and apostles and by His ever-to-be-adored Son. 

Some people can do anything that they are allowed to do, 
but waste their energies in lamenting that they are not 
called on to do other people's work. 

He who can touch the secret springs of the heart, apart 
from circumstances and conditions, has often made a man 
glad when he has been racked with pain, or when he has 
been in the depths of poverty, or when he has been suffering 
at the demoniacal hands of inquisitors. 



spurgeon's gold. 119 

» 

To you is given not gold, nor silver, nor precious stones 
to fashion, but immortal spirits that shall glorify Christ on 
earth and in heaven. 

The Gospel is not sent to men to gratify their curiosity 
by letting them see how other people get to heaven. Christ 
did not come to amuse us, but to redeem us. 

The enemy can use humility for his purpose as well as 
pride. Whether he makes us think too much or too little 
of our work, it is all the same to him, so long as he can get 
us off from it. 

He that lavished money when he had it feels the want of 
it all the more when it is gone. 

I think you will find that tried saints are the most biblical 
saints. 

Everything seems lost, and yet as long as a man can look 
to God nothing is lost. 

Jesus founded His empire upon love and His own self- 
sacrifice is the corner-stone of that imperial fabric. 

I have never known more blissful seasons than those which 
my Lord vouchsafed me when I was abused by men and had 
to fight a weary battle. 

The Godly must die, even as others. Though our life be 
perfectly consecrated, yet it cannot forever be continued in 
this world. 

The acquisition of property often decreases a man rather 
than adds to him. Have you not seen a man become visi- 
bly smaller as his riches grew greater ? 

The spirit of the true man answers to this : He is always 
willing to set in order the court of conscience, and makes 
solemn trial of his heart and life. 

A hard-working young man with his wits about him will 
make money where others do nothing but lose it. 

A thousand instances prove that only by endurance can 
names be graven in the brass of history. To make a man 
a man, to bring his manhood forward, and to make other 
men see it, there must be endurance. 



120 spurgeon's gold. 

* 

Be first a man of God, after that a banker, or a merchant, 
or a workingman. Then the secondary character would 
rise in excellence and nobility. 

I know your sorrows make an excursion to the grave to 
look there for the deceased ones. You want to lift that 
coffin-lid and to unwrap the shroud. Oh, do not so, do not 
so ! He is not here ; the real man has gone. He may be 
dead to you for awhile, but he lives unto God. Yes, the 
dead one liveth, he liveth unto God. 

I expect that if you go into the business of mending your- 
self you will be like the man who had an old gun and took it 
to the gunsmith, and the gunsmith said, "Well, this would 
make a very good gun if it had a new stock and a new lock 
and a new barrel." So you would make a very good man 
by mending if you had a new heart and a new life, and 
were made new all over, so that there was not a bit of the 
old stuff left. It will be easier, a great deal, depend upon 
it, even for God to make you new than to mend you. What 
is wanted is that you should be made a new creature in 
Christ Jesus. 

Before you begin a thing make sure it is the right thing 
to do \ ask Mr. Conscience about it. Do not try to do 
what is impossible ; ask Common Sense. 

Deep sincerity breeds in a man a blessed indifference to 
the judgments of men. 

Adversity is the richest field in all the farm of life. 

Love the soul of every man with all the intensity of thy 
being. 

To tell out the heart to a patient listener is a great relief 
to a burdened spirit, and the heart must do it in its own 
way. 

Many people would like to go to heaven by an underground 
railway ; secrecy suits them. 

The religion of Jesus is unselfish ; it enlists a man as a 
crusader against everything that is unrighteous. 

Those who believe in Jesus may be called fools to- day y 
but men will think otherwise when they see them shine forth 
as the sun in the Father's kingdom. 



spurgeon's gold. 121 

» 

We are knights of the Red Cross, and our bloodless battles 
are against all things that degrade our fellow-men, whether 
they be causes social, political, or religious. 

God has been very merciful to some of us in never letting 
money come rolling in upon us, for most men are carried off 
their legs if they meet with a great wave of fortune. Many 
of us would have been bigger sinners if we had been trusted 
with larger purses. 

Religion must not be like a fine piece of mediaeval armor, 
to be hung upon the wall, or only worn on state occasions. 
No ; it is a garment for the house, the shop, the bank. 

To say there is a God is not much. It is the same as to 
say there is a bank ; but there may be a bank, and you may 
be miserably poor. There certainly is a God, but that God 
may be no source of comfort to you. The joy of the whole 
thing lies in that word "my." My God will hear me. 

Yonder young woman knows that according to God's 
word she must not marry that young man, for she would be 
unequally yoked together with an unbeliever. Now, she was 
quite willing to be baptized, and she is heartily willing to 
give her money to the Lord, and in fact to do anything ex- 
cept that one act of self-denial, which would require her to 
cease from a fond friendship. Yet, my friend, I do not 
know what sorrow you will make for yourself if you really 
break that salutary rule. I have seen many instances of 
mixed marriages, but I have had to mourn over nearly all 
of them as the cause of untold wretchedness. 

He who talks forever about himself has a foolish subject, 
and is likely to worry and weary all around him. 

True religion is diffusive and extensive in its operations. 

The indifference to Scripture is the great curse of the 
Church at this hour. 

The hand of faith is against all evil, and all evil is against 
faith. 

Men of the world teach us the value of joyous song. How 
readily the anchor rises when the sailors unite in cheery 
cries. 



122 spurgeon's gold. 

Our temptations are no inventions of nervousness nor 
hobgoblins of dreamy fear. 

As we would desire to receive sympathy and help in our 
hour of need, let us render it freely to those who are now 
enduring trial. 

An old man with his bones filled with the sin of his youth 
is a dreadful sight to look upon ; he is a curse to others and 
a burden to himself. 

Much of history is happily covered with a veil, so that its 
secret griefs do not become open miseries, else were the 
world too wretched for a tender heart to live in it. 

Every generous heart delights to think that "the poor 
have the gospel preached unto them." 

Ask Him to keep you in check, that you may not be 
working mischief in your haste which you will have to re- 
pent of in your leisure. 

History must repeat itself so long as we have the same 
human nature to deal with, the same sins to ensnare man- 
kind, the same truth to be trifled with, and the same devil 
to stir men up to the same mischief. 

True we shall pass through that river which is named 
Death ; but it is a misnomer ; like the Jordan when Isreal 
passed into Canaan, the Lord hath rebuked it, and it is 
dried up. We shall pass through the valley of the shadow 
of death, and that is all ; and thus we shall reach a higher 
stage of being, in which we shall be "forever with the 
Lord." 

John Ploughman feels a cold sweat at the thought of get- 
ting into the hands of lawyers. He does not mind going 
to Jericho, but he dreads the gentlemen on the road, for 
they seldom leave a feather upon any goose which they pick 
up. However, if men will fight they must not blame the 
lawyers; if law were cheaper, quarrelsome people would 
have more of it, and quite as much would be spent in the 
long run. Sometimes, however, we get dragged into court 
willy nilly, and then one had need be wise as a serpent and 
harmless as a dove. Happy is he who finds an honest lawyer 
and does not try to be his own client. 



spurgeon's gold. 123 

Before a man cracks a joke he should consider how he 
would like it himself, for many who give rough blows have 
very thin skins. Give only what you would be willing to 
take. 

There is grace for the man who quits his sin, but there is 
tribulation and wrath upon every man who doeth evil. 

Think also how much the world is injured by Christians 
who are not Christians. 

Nothing in the Gospel excuses sin ; nothing in it affords 
toleration for lust or anger, or dishonesty or falsehood. 

Thine open confession of Him in His own appointed way 
shall bring thee a fuller realization of salvation. 

Health is far more to be prized than wealth or honor or 
learning. 

The resurrection of Christ is the world's great hope con- 
cerning those that are asleep. 

No man talks of living without sin till he is taken in the 
net of self-deception. 

A world of sorrow comes through people not having made 
their wills. Have everything in order. 

The smile of a mother's face has enticed many into the 
right path, and the fear of bringing a tear into her eye has 
called off many a man from evil ways. The boy may have 
a heart of iron, but his mother can hold him like a magnet. 

If bodily filthiness is horrible to us, what must the filthi- 
ness of sin be to the pure and holy God. 

The history of grace begins earlier and goes on later, but 
in its middle point stands the cross. Of two eternities this 
is the hinge; of past decrees and future glories this is the 
pivot. 

Blessed above all other beings are those who have Jehovah 
to be their God and who are themselves the Lord's choice 
and care and delight. 

We dare say it very reverently, that we have a claim upon 
God when we are His servants. Of course, that claim is 
only such as He allows, and it is founded alone on grace ; 
but still it is a strong plea with our gracious Master. 



124 spurgeon's gold. 

It is a very curious thing that some of God's servants do 
draw a very great deal of consolation from comparatively 
trivial things. We are all the creatures of sentiment as well 
as of reason, and hence we are often strongly affected -by 
little things. But what a pity it is that we should need such 
little bits of things to cheer us up, when we have matters of 
far surer import to make us glad ! 

Let us pray for those who never pray for themselves: 
God's power can do for them what is far beyond our 
power. 

Encouragement is due to young converts. 

Even our apparent ills have been real blessings. 

Without a spiritual motive the best work is dead. 

Often the greatest of moral acts are done in secret. 

Some persons when they are angry will say things that 
never ought to be repeated, or even said for the first time. 

It is an instinct of the new life to rejoice in the salvation 

of souls. 

Jesus must have the pre-eminence among men, since he 
is in person and character pre-eminent. 

Buckle on your harness to war against your sins, for He 
will give you power to overcome them. 

If a fellow takes the trouble to flatter he expects to be 
paid for it, and he calculates that he will get his wages out 
of the soft brains of those he tickles. 

If we fetch our supplies from Him, if we move only at 
His bidding, if we intensely love Him, we shall be a people 
to be envied by all who know us. 

Demons that gather about our last hour shall flee away as 
bats fly out of a cavern scared by a torch ; they shall flee 
when they hear the voice, "Behold, he prayeth." 

It is a good thing to be under the sound of the Word of 
God. Even if the very lowest motive should induce per- 
sons to come to hear the Gospel, it is nevertheless a good 
thing that they should come. 



spurgeon's gold. 125 

» 

" This same Jesus shall so come in like manner. He 
went up as a matter of fact; not in poetic figure and spir- 
itual symbol, but as a matter of fact — "This same Jesus " 
literally went up. "This same Jesus" will literally come 
again. He will descend in clouds even as He went up in 
clouds. 

I shall forever respect the memory of a humble servant 
in the school wherein I was usher at Newmarket — an old 
woman, who talked with me concerning the things of the 
kingdom, and taught me the way of the Lord more per- 
fectly. She knew the doctrines of grace better than many 
a doctor of divinity, and she held them with the tenacious 
grasp of one who found her life in them. It was my great 
privilege to help her in her old age, and but a little while 
ago she passed away to heaven. Many things did I learn 
of her which to-day I delight to preach. 

They say a brain is worth little if you have not a tongue ; 
but what is a tongue worth without a brain ? 

Begin each day by giving the dew of the morning to com- 
munion with heaven. 

Let every thief know that the dying thief entered heaven 
by faith in Jesus. 

If the Lord Jesus Christ were to come to-day I should 
like Him to find me at my studying, praying, or preaching. 

If you hunt the butterfly of wealth too eagerly you may 
spoil it by the stroke with which you secure it. 

He has gained more than he has lost, even though he 
has lost everything, if he has gained contentment, conform- 
ity to the will of God, a deep experience, and a surer hope. 

It is not wisdom which leads teachers to become obscure ; 
if they teach at all they should adapt themselves to the dis- 
ciple's capacity. 

When men believe in lawyers and money-lenders (whether 
Jews or Gentiles), and borrow money, and speculate, and 
think themselves lucky fellows, they are shamefully igno- 
rant. 

There never was a serener mind than that of Jesus Christ 
our Lord. 



126 spurgeon's gold. 

Our way is up the river ■ we have to stem the current 
and struggle against a flood which would readily bear us to 
destruction. 

Companions for apostles are only to be produced in the 
school of Holy Scripture. Those who have communed 
with Moses and David and the prophets are fit to associate 
with an apostle. 

There dwells upon this earth a mysterious Being, whose 
office is to renew the fallen and restore the wandering. We 
cannot see Him, or hear Him, yet He dwells in some of us 
as Lord of our nature. His chosen residence is a broken 
heart and a contrite spirit. 

Draw not the beloved bodies to the cemetery with dreary 
pomp and with black horses, but cover the coffin with 
sweet flowers and drape the horses with emblems of hope. 
It is the better birthday of the saint, yea, his truer wedding- 
day. Is it sad to have done with sadness ? Is it sorrowful 
to part with sorrow? 

I have sometimes thought to myself that it were better if 
there were no water baptism, seeing that it has become the 
nest of so much superstition; and the Lord's Supper, with 
all its blessed uses, has been so abused that one is apt to 
think that without outward ordinances there might be more 
spiritual religion ; but the Lord intends that the material- 
ism of man and of creation shall be uplifted, and that the 
body shall be raised incorruptible, and therefore has He 
given seals which touch the outward and material. 

Poor men will always be poor if they think they must be. 

Prayer will do anything — will do everything. 

Whatsoever the Lord doeth is full of wisdom, and the 
wise will search into it. 

There is now no spot on earth where God dwells in pref- 
erence to another. 

Serve the Lord in some way or other ; serve Him always ; 
serve Him intensely ; serve Him more and more. 

The Gospel offers you no opportunity of going on in sin 
and escaping without punishment. 



spurgeon's gold. 127 

The faith that saves is not always full-grown ; there is 
room for us to believe more, and to expect more, of our 
blessed Lord. 

Certain neighbors of mine laugh at me for being a tee- 
totaller, and I might well laugh at them for being drunken, 
only I feel more inclined to cry that they should be such 
fools. 

It will be an awful thing for the man who used profane 
imprecations to find out at last that his prayers were heard, 
and that they will be answered. 

Alas ! that men should sin away their souls so lightly, as 
if self-destruction were some merry game that they were 
playing at, whereas it is a heaping up unto themselves wrath 
against the day of wrath. 

Faith is the queen bee. You may get temperance, love, 
hope, and all those other bees into the hive ; but the main 
thing is to get simple faith in Christ, and all the rest will 
come afterward. 

Could we lift the tops of the houses, could we exhibit the 
skeletons hidden in closets, could we take away the curtains 
from human breasts, what sorrows we should see ; and the 
mass of those sorrows — not the whole of them, but the 
mass — would be found to come from sin. 

I often see upon a sunny wall a chrysalis, and when I go 
to take it down I find that the summer's sun has shone upon 
it and the insect has developed, and left nothing but an 
empty case behind. How often in the pew we find the 
chrysalis of a man, but where is the man himself? Wait 
till to-morrow morning, and see him in his shop ; there is 
the man ; or, to follow up the figure, there is the butterfly 
with all its wings. Wait till you find our friend engaged 
in secular employment to his own advantage, and then you 
will see what he is made of; but in the work of the Lord 
he is not worth his salt. 

Better kind words to the living than fine speeches over 
the grave. 

Grace does not run in the blood, but we generally find 
that the Timothies have mothers of a godly sort. 



128 spurgeon's gold. 

A mocking word cuts worse than a scythe, and the wound 
is harder to heal. A blow is much sooner forgotten than a 
jeer. 

Waste is of Satan, not of God. 

Some men are blinded by their worldly business, and 
could not see heaven itself if the windows, were open over 
their heads. 

If ever you live to want what you once wasted, it will fill 
you with woe enough to last you to your grave. 

If you want to be secure never stand as security for any 
living man, woman, child, youth, maiden, cousin, brother, 
uncle, or mother-in-law. 

Begin early to teach, for children begin early to sin. 
Catch them young and you may hope to keep them. 

Often debt is the worst kind of poverty, because it breeds 
deceit. Men do not like to face their circumstances, and 
so they turn their backs on the truth. 

If a man cannot pay his debts he must not think of giv- 
ing, for he has nothing of his own, and it is thieving to 
give away other people's property. 

There is a text, a very short one, which I would like often 
to preach from, in reference to those who are newly saved, 
and I would invite you continually to be practicing it : that 
text is, "Encourage him." 

Whenever there is a holy deed to be done, our mathe- 
matical-minded unbelievers are prompt with their estimates 
of cost and their prudent forecastings of grave deficiencies. 
We are great at calculations when we are little at believing. 

To doubt is natural to fallen men, for we have within us 
an evil heart of unbelief. It is abominably wicked, I grant 
you ; but still it is natural, because of the downward ten- 
dency of our depraved hearts. 

I heard a brother in a prayer-meeting say, "The Lord 
hath done great things for us, whereof we desire to be 
glad; " and I wanted to jump down that man's throat and 
pull that passage back again and put it into its natural 
shape. 



spurgeon's gold. 129 

In our utterances there has been faith mixed with unbelief, 
love defaced with a want of submission, gratitude combined 
with distrust, humility flavored with self-conceit, courage un- 
dermined with cowardice, fervor mingled with indifference. 

He who never owns that he is wrong will never get right. 

Little things please little minds and nasty things please 
dirty minds. 

Wit should be a shield for defense and not a sword for 
offense. 

There is not one among us who has lived a day without 
sin. 

Christ and a crust is riches, but a broken character is the 
worst of bankruptcy. 

Beware of trusting all your secrets with anybody but your 
wife. 

It is wise to marry when we can marry wisely, and then 
the sooner the better. 

He that earns an estate will keep it better than he that 
inherits it. 

Perseverance is the main thing in life. To hold on and 
hold out to the end is the chief matter. 

Everybody who does not get on lays it all on competition. 

A man never listens to reason when he has made up his 
mind to act unreasonably. 

Those who despise their neighbors come to be despised 
themselves. 

People don't think much of a man's piety when his prom- 
ises are like pie-crust, made to be broken. 

Everybody should know what most concerns him and 
makes him most useful. 

Stick to your calling, plod on, and be content ; for, make 
sure, if you can undergo you shall overcome. 

Use each thing and each man according to common- 
sense and you will be uncommonly sensible. 

9s 



130 spurgeon's gold. 

A boy can be driven to learn till he loses half his wits ; 
forced fruits have little flavor \ a man at five is a fool at fif- 
teen. 

Never mind the coat, give me the man ; shells are noth- 
ing, the kernel is everything. 

There must be something very much amiss about a man 
who is not missed when he dies. 

Of all dust the worst for the eyes is gold dust. A bribe 
blinds the judgment, and riches darken the mind. 

We are all at school, and our great Teacher writes many 
a bright lesson on the black-board of affliction. 

If you are going to be a champion of reformation, first 
be yourself reformed. 

It is in the Lord's word that the hope of His people finds 
support. 

The most abominable beings out of hell are Christians 
without Christianity ; and there are plenty of them. 

The Lord Jesus always owns a faith which comes toward 
him, however lame it may be. 

To draw Him nearer to me, and myself nearer to Him, 
is the innermost longing of my soul. 

Let all the necessities of men impel you, compel you, con- 
strain you to be blessing them. 

The world is always looking to the Church, not so much 
to hear her teachings as to see her doings. 

He has an opportunity for distinguishing himself who is 
placed amid temptations and perils. 

I cannot imagine an occasion for glorifying God equal 
to the fact that man has sinned, since God has given Christ 
to die for sinners. 

Happy is the man who is happy in his wife. Let him 
love her as he loves himself, and a little better, for she is 
his better half. 

I would not have a converted person wait a week before 
trying to do something for Jesus. Run as soon as you find 
your feet. 



spurgeon's gold. 131 

» 

He will certainly come in His own person to reward His 
saints ; and ere He comes He sees what you are doing. Ii 
this does not nerve you to tireless diligence in holy service, 
what can ? 

Instead of being discouraged because what we do is un- 
worthy of God, and insignificant compared with what was 
done by others, let us gather up our strength to reform our 
errors and reach to higher attainments. 

When old age comes on and memory fails me, that 
which my soul shall hold as a death grip will not be his- 
torical remembrance, classical lore, or theological learning, 
but what she knows by inward experience of the Lord her 
God. 

If my Lord should say to me, "From this hour I will al- 
ways answer your prayer just as you pray it," the first peti- 
tion I would offer would be, "Lord, do 710 thing of the sort.' 1 
Because that would be putting the responsibility of my life 
upon myself, instead of allowing it to remain upon God. 

Those who are quick to promise are generally slow to per- 
form. 

Gladness is the privilege of saints. 

Real prayer cannot come from men whose characters are 
contrary to the mind of God. 

If you would have Christ for a Saviour you must also take 
Him for a King. 

A fool soon makes up his mind, becaitse there is so very little 
of it ; but a wise man waits and considers. 

Those saints who have been in glory now these thousands 
of years cannot be more blessed than the latest arrivals. 

The right thing is to feel that the more God loves you 
the more you love Him ; the more He does for you the more 
will you do for Him. 

The secret sustenance of the soul by God is very precious. 
It is not observed of men, but therein the saints are made 
to magnify their God. 

It is better to be a good housewife, or nurse, or domestic 
servant than to be a powerless preacher or a graceless talker. 



132 spurgeon's gold. 

There are many in this world who ignore sorrow, who 
pass by grief, who are deaf to lamentation and blind to dis- 
tress. 

Children of prayer will grow up to be children of praise; 
mothers who have wept before God for their sons will one 
day sing a new song over them. 

The points in which there is a weakness in your natural con- 
stitution and in which you have made failures are the points 
at which you must set a double guard. 

Just now the great thing is to see how you and I can get 
evil out of the world, and how we can lift up the fallen and 
restore those who have gone astray. 

He whose faith stands upon the concensus of popular 
opinion has placed his feet upon the sand, but he who has 
read his Bible and has been taught of the Spirit of God 
what truth is will hold to it, come what may. 

Apart from the glories of heaven I would wish to live 
trusting in my God and resting in Him for this present life, 
since I need his present aid for every day as truly as I shall 
need it at the last day. 

London is worse than a wilderness to many ; a man may 
lay himself down and die in these streets and nobody will 
care for him. The millions will pass him by, not for want of 
kindness, but from want of thought. There is no such hor- 
rible wilderness as a wilderness of men. 

They are most apt to speak ill of others who do most ill 
themselves. 

Many a woman is destroyed by her clothes. 
Many a man is destroyed by his eating. 
London is a simmering caldron of vice and crime. 
Our sicknesses are of the Lord's appointing. 
When man acts according to God's order he lives. 
Of how small account is the judgment of men. 

Ignorance of spelling books is very bad, but ignorance of 
hard work is worse. 



spurgeon's gold. 133 

» 

Ah, friend, if the grace of God by trial shall work in you 

the quiet patience which never grows angry and never ceases 

to love, you may have lost a trifle of comfort, but you have 

gained a solid weight of character. 

He that s-oweth the seed of heresy and evil doctrine en- 
tails upon succeeding generations an evil and a plague, and 
his very name shall rot ; but he that soweth the good seed 
shall be the father of ten thousand successive harvests. 

If we are to live, let us live to noble purpose. It would 
be a great pity to lose a single year, much less a long life. 
If you are going to live a hundred years, begin them with 
God. 

We are looking forward to His second advent for the 
uplifting of the Church to a higher platform than that upon 
which it now stands. Then shall the militant become tri- 
umphant, and the laboring become exultant. 

There is one person who plagues you; if you could only 
get away from him, you would be content ; but that person 
happens to be yourself, and there appears to be no rest for 
you, either in company or in solitude. 

Though it may seem a very small thing to grieve a pious 
child or to vex a poor', godly woman, God does not think 
it so. He remembers jests and scoffs leveled at His little 
ones, and He bids those who indulge in them to take heed. 

Even the thoughtless or trifling repetition of the name of 
the Lord involves great sin, for thus a man taketh the sacred 
name in vain ; yet men trifle with that name in common 
conversation, and that with fearful frequency. 

Studying the lives of eminent men, we come to this con- 
clusion, that on the whole it is good for a man to bear the 
yoke; good for a man to breast the billows; good for a 
man to pass through fire and through water, and so to learn 
sublime lessons. 

All the wit in the world is not in one head, and therefore 
the wisest man living is not bound to look after all his 
neighbors' matters. 

Much of what is called prayer is the husk, and not the 
kernel, of prayer. 



134 spurgeon's gold. 

Each hour of sin brings its hardness and its difficulty of 
change. 

The desire of unholy gain is called filthy lucre, because 
it leads men to do dirty deeds which else they would not 
think of. 

God's children always play the fool when they play the 
judge; they are never in order when they act as if they were 
the head of the family of grace. 

Some of us may spend our next Sabbath with the angels. 
Let us rejoice and be glad at the bare thought of it. 

When you feel most unfit to resort to God you may still 
go to Him, for He is your fitness and your physician. 

No signs can be more alarming than the growing infidelity 
and worldliness which I see among those who call themselves 
Christians. 

If a man calls himself my friend and leaves the ways of 
God, then his way and mine are different; he who is no 
friend to the good cause is no friend of mine. 

The Lord likes His servants to have such an experience 
that their testimony shall have a man at the back of it. 
He would have their lives sustain and explain their testimo- 
nies. 

I might curse myself seven times deep by a prayer within 
the next seven minutes, if there were no safeguards and 
limits to the promise of prayer being answered. 

Who are the people that give up holy practice? Why, 
the people that are not dwelling in the power of the Holy 
Ghost, and are not full of the life of God. 

Consciences used to work up and down, yes or no ; but 
now they have an eccentric action, altogether indescribable. 
A man serves the devil nowadays and gets the devil's pay, 
and all the while talks of serving God. 

In grace you can be under bonds, yet not in bondage. 
I am in the bonds of wedlock, but I feel no bondage ; on 
the contrary, it is a joy to be so bound. The bond of grace 
is a marriage bond, uniting us to Him whom we love above 
all, even the altogether lovely Bridegroom of our souls. 



spurgeon's gold. 135 

Our Lord and Saviour came when time was full and like 
a harvest ready for His reaping, and so will He come again 
when once more the age is ripe and ready for His presence. 

I would sooner be a cat on hot bricks or a toad under a 
harrow than let my own children be my masters. 

Rest you assured that God will care for you if you make 
His service your delight. 

The whole course of the Lord's dealing is calculated to 
inspire confidence. 

The mass of us cannot go abroad as missionaries, but we 
can all be messengers for Christ in our own city. 

Nothing hardens like the Gospel when it is long trifled 
with. To lie asoak in the truth without receiving it into 
the heart is sure destruction. 

Do what the Lord bids you, when He bids you, where He 
bids you, as He bids you, as long as He bids you, and do it 
at once. 

When you relieve the wants of a man in health you may 
possibly assist him in his vices, but in helping the sick poor 
you can do no wrong, 

If you have been on the borders of the grave and the 
Gospel has given you joy and gladness, then you know how 
true it is. Experimental knowledge is the best and surest. 

God seems to talk to me in every primrose and daisy, to 
smile upon me from every star, to whisper to me in every 
breath of morning air, and to call aloud to me in every 
storm. 

I cannot convey to you a sense of the joy of a face up- 
lifted unto God. You must feel it for yourselves, by lifting 
up your own faces. 

Let us build our God a house of praises ; let us lay the 
deep foundations in love, set up the pillars with gratitude, 
and roof in the whole with joyous hallelujahs. 

There are so many gates to the grave. We can die any- 
where, at any time, by any means. Not alone abroad are 
we in danger, but at home in security we are still in peril. 



136 spurgeon's gold. 

We dare not say that we have kept the ten commands 
from our youth up; on the contrary, we. are compelled by 
our consciences to confess that in spirit and in heart, if not 
in act, we have continually broken the law of God. 

If you professing Christian people are as greedy and hard 
as other people in your dealings with the world, and if in 
your families you are as quarrelsome and untruthful as the 
ungodly, God cannot come to your tabernacles. 

Whatever men in their folly may talk as to neglecting the 
outward means and sitting still and doing nothing because 
God will do his own work, we hear nothing of the kind 
from Jesus. Therefore, despise not means, and at the same 
time do not rest in them. 

He who will not go to bed till he pleases everybody will 
have to sit up a great many nights. 

The Lord will fulfill His word thoroughly. 

Loving-kindness underlies and overlays His wrath. 

The conquering weapon of the Christian is love. 

A man of God is not prepared to enjoy success till he 
has tasted defeat. 

Faith is the fighting principle and the conquering prin- 
ciple. By faith God is greatly glorified, and hence by faith 
Satan is greatly annoyed. 

Very early in life some are brought to Jesus with little 
terror or distress of mind. Let them be very grateful for it. 

It is a solemn thing to have God so near, but the joy is 
equal to the solemnity. 

Blessed shall that man be who has no answer to give to 
God's call but just "Here am I." 

We should, in all probability, see a much more rapid 
growth in grace among our young converts if they were bet- 
ter nursed and watched over. 

It is a sin to put people where they are likely to sin. If 
you believe the old saying, that when you set a beggar on 
horseback he will ride to the devil, don't let him have a 
horse of yours. 



spurgeon's gold. 137 

Christ's discipleship is always practical; it is of the heart 
and of the hand as well as of the head. 

Your conviction that you are clean before God will give 
you confidence in telling out to others the story of the cross. 

At home one might not have all the skill of the hospital 
at command, but one would be sure of a certain priceless 
tenderness which no nurse can rival. 

The man of God is pricked and torn by the briers of the 
age in which he travels ; he is vexed and wearied with the 
bribery and corruption all around him. 

I do not wonder that men who have tasted of the grace of 
God, and feel that the Lord has done great things for them, 
whereof they are glad, do feel like crying out for joy. 

Give me the man who understands that second thoughts 
are not always the best, for they are apt to chill, and the 
best thought is that which comes from a heart fired with 
the love of Christ ; but that same characteristic, if not kept 
in proper order by the Spirit of God, may lead you into a 
world of mischief. 

Religious deceivers are the worst of vermin. 

Now is the time of battle, but the second advent shall 
bring both victory and rest. 

To judge according to outward circumstances has been 
the tendency of men in all times. 

The Lord knows the street and He knows the house where 
the sinner lives who is to be blessed by Him. 

Remember that your own thoughts of what God is are far 
from being correct unless they are drawn from His own 
revelation. 

Grace delights in dealing with great and glaring sin and 
putting away the crying crimes of great offenders. 

Those who are most afflicted in this life may have the 
highest glory in the life to come. 

Might not the Lord stand in a prayer-meeting and hear 
a dozen of us talk our piece and never say, " Behold, he 
prayeth?" 



138 spurgeon's gold. 

There is an adaptation in the Bible for human beings of 
all ages, and therefore it has a fitness for children. 

When a true child of God is in trouble it is wonderful 
how dear the Bible becomes to him — ay, the very words of it. 

When a boy is rebellious, conquer him, and do it well the 
first time, that there may be no need to do it again.. A 
child's first lesson should be obedience, and after that you 
may teach it what you please. 

Happy is the man who has been enabled to endure ; he 
rises from the deeps of woe like a pearl-finder from the sea, 
rich beyond comparison. 

God takes the meaning of our groans and tears, and when 
we fail to express ourselves suitably in words He reads our 
hearts and accepts our secret meanings. 

I have distinctly seen a man become "the architect of 
his own fortune ' ' and the destroyer of himself. He has 
built up a palatial estate upon the ruins of his own man- 
hood. 

There are no loose threads in the providence of God, no 
stitches are dropped, no events are left to chance. The 
great clock of the universe keeps good time, and the whole 
machinery of Providence moves with unerring punctuality. 

I think we have read enough of the history of God's 
dealings with His people to understand that this is the way 
of Him — that if He ever is absent from His people it is not 
in their time of direst need, and if ever He does reveal Him- 
self to them as He does not unto the world it is when they 
are bereaved of all outward consolation and for His sake 
are made to bear tribulation. 

There are fools enough in the world, and there can be 
no need that Christian men should swell the number. 

Hell, however painted, is never so terrible a thing as the 
death which fills it. 

This sacred book is infallible, but not our thoughts. 

We are all odd in some way or other. 

Obedience is the best of worship. 



SPURGEON S GOLD. 139 

Our zeal for God ought to be as fresh as if we had just 
begun to delight in Him. 

One of the surest evidences of a living faith is prayer. 

Jesus has not come into the world to make sin less terri- 
ble. 

If our faith is to grow exceedingly we must maintain 
constant intercourse with God. 

When a man speaks so that you cannot understand him, 
the usual reason is that he does not understand himself. 

The confession of sin, the longing for mercy, the groan- 
ing for grace — these are the soul and spirit of prayer. 

It is grand when the wife knows her place and keeps it, 
and they both pull together in everything. Then she is a 
helpmeet indeed and makes the house a home. 

I reckon that those prayers which cannot be expressed in 
language are often the most deep and fervent. 

Persistence in known sin, and especially indulgence in 
enmity and hatred, are so destructive to prayer that till we 
are free from them we do not pray. 

If you feel quite content with your own prayers, permit 
me to suggest that you do not pray, for few who pray aright 
are ever content with their own petitions. 

Those who dream themselves to belong to the Good- 
enough family will find themselves bad enough, and the 
Too -goods will find themselves shut out of heaven. 

You that are the people of God, you may sometimes in 
your willfulness wish that you could get away from the all- 
searching eye ; but if you could do so it would be hell to 
you. 

The devil never reckons a man to be lost so long as he 
has a good mother alive. 

If we begin, continue, "and end with God, our way will 
be strewn with blessings. 

Plunge yourself into your work with whole-hearted devo- 
tion, and you shall yet discover some hidden jewel which 
shall adorn Immanuel's diadem. 



140 spurgeon's gold. 

Young men have flung away all hope of salvation in order 
that they might be thought to be men of culture ; they have 
abjured faith in order to be esteemed "free-thinkers" by 
those whose opinions were not worth a pin's head. I charge 
you, dear friend, if you are beginning at all to be a slave 
of other people, break these wretched and degrading bonds. 

That which a man does when he thinks that he is entirely 
by himself is the best revelation of the man. 

You are not half as happy as you might be, because you 
do not study the Book, wherein, as in a glass, you may see 
the face of Jehovah your God. 

If you stand half a mile off from a man and throw the 
Gospel at him you will miss him, but if you go close to 
him and lay hold upon him, giving him a hearty grip of 
the hand, and show that you have an affection for him, you 
will, by God's blessing, lead him in the right way. 

You can never pray an inch beyond the tether of the 
promise with any assurance of being heard. For my own 
part, I always feel on sure ground with God when I can 
quote His own words. 

Sensible men don't marry a wardrobe or a bonnet-box ; 
they want a woman of sense, and women of that kind al- 
ways dress sensibly and not gaudily. 

Do not bury a man before he is dead ; hope that so long 
as a sinner lives he may yet live unto God. Be hopeful 
that He who placed this sinner in your way and you in the 
sinner's way has designs of love which are about to be ac- 
complished. 

True religion is always personal, but it becomes wonder- 
fully so when a man is specially arrested by sovereign grace ; 
for then he adores as if he were the only man in the uni- 
verse, and beholds God as if no other eye throughout all 
the ages had ever beheld him. 

He who thinks it easy to bring up a family never had one 
of his own. 

Babes receive impressions long before we are aware of the 
fact. During the first months of a child's life it learns more 
than we imagine. 



SPURGEON S GOLD. . 141 

» 

What numbers of professors I have known who go into 
one place of worship and hear one form of doctrine and 
apparently approve it because the preacher is "a, clever 
man ! ' ' They hear an opposite teaching, and they are 
equally at home, because again it is "a clever man!" 
They join with a church, and you ask them, " Do you agree 
with the views of that community?" They neither know 
nor care what those views may be ; one doctrine is as good 
as another to them. Their spiritual appetite can enjoy 
soap as well as butter ; they can digest bricks as well as 
bread. These religious ostriches have a marvelous power 
of swallowing everything ; they have no spiritual discern- 
ment, no appreciation of truth. They follow any ' ' clever ' ' 
person, and in this prove that they are not the sheep of our 
Lord's pasture. 

The best piece of furniture I have ever had in my house is 
the cross of affliction. 

Life is long to look forward to ; but I appeal to every 
aged person whether it is not very short to look back upon. 

Without a scriptural training a convert has no grit, no 
backbone, and no soul in him. 

If you want power in prayer you must have purity in life. 

To day the world' } s one and only remedy is the cross. 

It is one thing to believe there is a God, but it is quite 
another thing to know it by coming into personal contact 
with Him. 

Happy are they among women who see their sons and 
their daughters walking in the truth. 

The system of salvation by atonement is calculated to pro- 
duce truthful men. 

If thou hast a faith which looks to ceremonies, creeds, 
prayers, and feelings it will fail thee when most thou need- 
est help. 

If wealth and righteousness run counter to each other, let 
the gold perish, but hold thou fast to righteousness. 

Many a man has thrown his soul away for a little honor, 
or for the transient satisfaction of success in trifles. 



142 spurgeon's gold. 

We must preach the coming of the Lord, and preach it 
somewhat more than we have done, because it is the driving 
power of the Gospel. 

Contemplation of Christ Himself may be so carried out 
as to lead you away from Christ ; the recluse meditates on 
Jesus, but he is as unlike the busy, self-denying Jesus as well 
can be. 

God can work by any means. He can never be short of 
instruments. For his battles he can find weapons on the 
hearth, weapons in the kneading-trough, weapons in the 
poor man's basket. 

Those Psalms are marvelous. David seems to have lived 
for us all ; he was not so much one man as all men in one. 
Somewhere or other, the great circle of his experience 
touches yours and mine, and the Holy Ghost by David has 
furnished us with the best expressions which we can utter 
before the Lord in prayer. 

Some fools are left alive to write on the monuments of 
those who are buried. 

Many will only act as others act ; they must keep in the 
fashion. 

Every one that is born of the Spirit of God is brother to 
every other that is born of the same Spirit. 

We have never reached the sum of our grace -given privi- 
leges till we are more at home with God than with any one 
else in the universe. 

No man knoweth what villainy he is capable of; he only 
needs to be placed under certain circumstances and he will 
develop into a very fiend. 

If you want anything done well do it yourself, with this 
exception — that if you want your character defe?ided you 
should always let that alone. 

It matters not to you or me what nationality He actually 
came from, for the most cosmopolitan of men was the Christ 
of God. 

Too much cunning overdoes its work, and in the long run 
there is no craft which is so wise as simple honesty. 



spurgeon's gold. 143 

» 

Can we be busy with earthly cares all the six days of the 
week and be ready for the holy Sabbath without a thought? 
I trow not. 

Most kings inherit what other swords have won, but 
Jesus himself with His own blood hath purchased a kingdom 
to Himself. 

The Gospel gives man a hope, and that is a grand thing 
for the degraded and self-condemned. 

It is a great deal better to sift an affair to the bottom than 
it is to be always tormented by suspicion. 

We meet with a certain class of men who are rather pert 
and forward, as the fashion of the day is in certain quarters ; 
and then we do not think so much of them as they do of 
themselves. 

Do not let us suffer our lamentations to be written in a 
book and our thanksgivings to be spoken to the wind. 
Write not your complaints in marble and your praises upon 
the sand. 

Ask those that have had to live with converted people 
whether the transformation has not been marvelous. Christ 
makes new servants, new masters, new friends, new brothers, 
new sisters. 

You can do a great many things with a dead man, but 
you cannot make him stand upright ; you may try most 
earnestly, but a corpse cannot stand \ until you put life into 
the body it will fall to the ground ; and so if the life of 
God be not in you you cannot hold the truth, or maintain 
purity, or walk in integrity. 

We have more blessings than we can count, even now. 

He who prays trusts, and thus reveals the faith which 
saves. 

You cannot call back the words which now cause you to 
bite your tongue with regret. 

The trial of temptation of each man is distinct from that 
of every other. 

What a sinful power imagination is, and how difficult it 
is to govern it. 



144 spurgeon's gold. 

We need trials as a test as much as we need divine truth 
as our food. 

His was a grand life-work, but He never seemed to be 
confused, excited, worried, or hurried, as certain of His 
people are. 

Get a firm confidence in God and you need not inquire 
what is going to happen : all must be well with you. 

Sanctified trouble has a great tendency to breed sympa- 
thy, and sympathy is to the church as oil to machinery. 

A father will not stand by to see his child abused, and 
the Great Father above is as tender and fond as any other 
father. 

Manhood is a great deep. I set it not side by side with 
the fathomless abyss of Godhead, but I know of nothing else 
which surpasses it. 

Inside a man's heart there is need of a thorough plow- 
ing by God's grace, for if any part of our nature is left to 
itself the weeds of sin smother the soul. 

You, my Christian brother, cannot fall into sin without 
its being poison to you, as well as to anybody else; in fact, 
to you it is more evidently poison than to those hardened 
to it. 

Self-denial and taking up the cross are but forms of bless- 
edness. If we seek first the kingdom of God and His 
righteousness all other things shall be added to us. 

Some of the purest Christians that have ever lived have 
had the most sickness to bear, and by that means they have 
been made more meet for heaven, even as the sycamore fig 
by being bruised becomes ripe. 

It is only foolish persons who will not mention death. 
If you are all right with God, it can be no trouble to you 
to remember that as your years multiply there must be so 
many the fewer in which you are to abide here below. 

A world where everything was easy would be a nursery 
for babies, but not at all a fit place for men. 

Believers ought to be unutterably happy. 



spurgeon's gold. 145 

Time was, whenever I heard a sceptical remark, I felt 
wounded and somewhat shaken. I am no longer shaken 
by these wandering winds. There are certain things of 
which I am as sure as of my own existence; I have seen, 
tasted, and handled them, and I am past being argued out 
of them by those who know nothing about them. 

It is appointed unto men once to die, and that appoint- 
ment stands. 

God will hear us when we hear Him; He will do our 
will when we do His will. 

It is a grand thing to know what we are living for, and to 
live for a worthy object with the undivided energy of our 
being. 

Every now and then we need a few drops of the oil of 
gladness to make the wheels of our work move pleasantly. 

An alms given to the poor is good as a work of humanity, 
but it will be only a dead work if a desire to be seen of 
men is found at the bottom of it. 

Prudence is wisdom, for it adapts means to ends; but 
anxiety is folly, for it groans and worries and accomplishes 
nothing. 

Another part of the believer's great gain lies in the con- 
sciousness that all things are working together for his good. 

You cannot ask the Lord to bless you because of any de- 
sert or merit you have, for you have no trace of any such 
thing, but you will be wise to plead your necessities. 

When a man thinks that his place is below him he will 
pretty soon be below his place, and therefore a good opin- 
ion of your own calling is by no means an evil. 

Remember that perdition for the orthodox will be quite 
as horrible as eternal ruin for the heterodox. It will be a 
dreadful thing to go to hell with a sound head and a rotten 
heart. 

Do not slice pieces out of your manhood and then hope to 
fill up the vacancies with bank notes. He who loses man- 
liness or godliness to gain gold is a great cheater of himself. 

10 s 



146 spurgeon's gold. 

I believe that as a child of God grows in sanctification 
he deepens in humility, and as he advances to perfection he 
sinks in his own esteem. 

Whenever the coming of our Lord shall be — and oh that 
it were to day, for we never wanted Him more than now ! — 
whenever His second advent shall take place, it shall not 
be a dishonor to the Church, but it will be her glory to tri- 
umph with the King at her head. 

What a wretched business it must be to be in dread of 
your own thoughts ! You dare not sit alone in your 
chamber for half an hour and think, because if you did you 
would begin to think of dying, and you could not bear to 
think of that without a God. 

Who would win must learn to bear. 

It is for the truly spiritual that God reserves the choicest 
of His dainties. 

The Scriptuies do not save, but they are able to make a 
man wise unto salvation. 

The man who truly possesses patience is the man that has 
been tried. 

Some men are always very ready at counting the pennies 
which they have not got. 

Undue anxiety is very common among city men, and it 
is not rare anywhere. 

If you are too precise may the Lord set you on fire and 
consume your bonds of red tape ! 

If our life be of grace there is no room for boasting, but 
much space for soul-humbling. 

Whenever a man proposes to obey in a week's time he 
confesses himself to be disobedient for that time. 

There are no difficulties and obscurities about the Gospel 
except such as we ourselves create. 

I should like you to be able to think about death. If 
you do not like to think about it at all, my dear friends, I 
think that there is something wrong in you and you ought 
to take warning from your own dislike. 



spurgeon's gold. 147 

We must not judge according to the sight of the eyes or 
according to present conditions or we shall make gross mis- 
takes. 

Till a thing is done men wonder that you think it can be 
done, and when you have done it they wonder it was never 
done before. 

Propriety hinders very many ; decorum is their death. I 
do not know the precise meaning of it, but there are gen- 
teel people about who consider that the finest thing on 
earth is " propriety/ ' 

Gideon was a man of great faith ; his name shines among 
the heroes of great faith in the eleventh chapter of the Epis- 
tle to the Hebrews, and you and I will do well if we attain 
to the same rank in the peerage of faith as he did. 

" Well," cries one, " but, you know, we must live." I 
am not sure about that. There are occasions when it would 
be better not to live. An old heraldic motto says, "Better 
death than false of faith." 

Feelings are variable as the wind; feelings depend so 
much upon the body and outward surroundings — so much 
even upon the condition of the atmosphere. I protest that 
as to feelings I go up and down very much according to the 
weather-glass. Therefore I make small account of my feel- 
ings. 

He is the greatest fool of all who pretends to explain 
everything, and says he will not believe what he cannot un- 
derstand. 

Those who are washed in the blood of Jesus shall never 
be drowned in the sea of sorrow. 

The best of men are men at the best, and men of strong 
faith are often men of strong conflicts. 

The whole tendency of our holy faith is to elevate and 
to encourage. 

He that is afraid of solemn things has probably solemn 
reason to be afraid of them. 

Jesus will not be your Saviour if you refuse to let Him be 
your Sovereign. You cannot have half of your Lord. 



148 spurgeon's gold. 

Our prayer is the shadow of a coming blessing. As 
" Coming events cast their shadows before them," so, when 
God is about to bless us, He moves us to pray for that very 
blessing. 

You, dear teachers in the school, may be teaching Lu- 
thers and Melanchthons ; you may be instructing in those 
young girls holy women who shall serve the Lord abun- 
dantly. 

When a man does not pray in the Lord's appointed way, 
nor through Jesus Christ, nor in dependence upon the Holy 
Spirit, he does not pray at all. However fine his prayer, it 
is only a splendid sin. 

Thousands have had to weep over their blunder in look- 
ing for their heaven on earth ; but they follow each other 
like sheep through a gap, not a bit the wiser for the expe- 
rience of generations. 

Among all the carcasses that shall be washed up on the 
Dead Sea shore there shall never be found the corpse of 
Little-faith. 

Give us the first seven years of a child with God's grace 
and we may defy the world, the flesh, and the devil to ruin 
that immortal soul. Those first years, while yet the clay 
is soft and plastic, go far to decide the form of the vessel. 

He that sitteth on the throne can do for you what you 
cannot do for yourself, and as He made you once and you 
became marred by sin He can new-make you, for He saith, 
"Behold, I make all things new." 

The tendency everywhere is to say, ' ' Baptism should not 
be mentioned; it is sectarian." Who said so? If our 
Lord commanded it who dares to call it sectarian ? We are 
not commanded to preach a part of the Gospel, but the 
whole of the Gospel. 

Dancing masters and tailors may rig up a fop, but they 
cannot make a nothing into a man. 

He who gets beyond a disciple rises beyond his proper 
place. 

Each one pulls his fellow up or drags him down. Every 
man in the Church is either a help or a hindrance. 



spurgeon's gold. 149 

» 

You dream of perfection, but you are a mass of wants 
and infirmities and conceits, and if it were not for the infi- 
nite mercy of God, who deals tenderly with you, you would 
soon have most painfully to know it to your own dishonor 
and to the grief of your brethren round about you. 

A righteous sentence shall go forth from his mouth who 
knows not how to flatter the great. 

There was a time when Christian people thought it idle to 
send missionaries to the heathen, but that time only survives 
in regretful memories. 

If we have a special joy in Jesus in any one capacity more 
than another, let us be joyful in Him as our King. 

On taking a survey of our whole life, we see that the 
kindness of God has run all through it like a silver thread. 

We have never reaped such a harvest from any seed as 
from that which fell from our hand while tears were falling 
from our eyes. 

To have a great many aims and objects is much the same 
thing as having no aim all ; for if a man shoots at many 
things he will hit none, or none worth the hitting. 

Generous souls are made happy by the happiness of others ; 
the money they give to the poor buys them more pleasure 
than any other that they lay out. 

The habit of private prayer and the constant practice of 
heart-fellowship with the Most High are the surest indicators 
of the work of the Holy Spirit upon the heart. 

The pent-up misery and the seething sin of London may 
yet produce a second edition of the French Revolution un- 
less the grace of God shall interpose. 

Think what it will be to have your motives all brought to 
light; to have it proven that you were godly for the sake of 
gain ; that you were generous out of ostentation or zealous 
for love of praise ; that you were careful in public to main- 
tain a religious reputation, but that all the while everything 
was done for self and self only. 

Do nothing when you are out of temper, and then you 
will have the less to undo. 



150 spurgeon's gold. 

If you come to Christ I do not care how you come, for 
I am sure you could not have come at all if the Father had 
not drawn you ; and if he has drawn you, there is no mistake 
in your method of coming. 

How often have I seen the invalid, who might almost long 
for death, draw out a long existence of continuous pain, 
while the man who shook your hand with a powerful grip and 
stood erect like a column of iron is laid low of a sudden 
and is gone. 

You had better offend a king than one of the Lord's 
little ones. 

To have a hope that you can be a better man is a great 
help in escaping from sin. 

Monsters that revel in darkness must be dragged into the 
open, that they may be withered up by the light. 

Eternal sovereignty is the fountain-head of those gracious 
decrees in which the Lord hath purposed to do good to the 
sons of men. 

A bad example, a lewd expression, an unholy life, may 
be the means of drawing others down to perdition ; and 
those that destroy others, and so are soul-murderers, are 
among the chief of sinners. 

After you have believed unto life you will go and do all 
manner of holy deeds as the result of your new life ; but do 
not attempt them with the view of earning life. 

I have no doubt that much sorrow might be prevented if 
words of encouragement were more frequently spoken fitly 
and in season ; and therefore to withhold them is sin. 

"Free grace" we mean still to say, for, as some people 
will not believe that grace is free, it is still necessary to 
make it very clear that it is so, and to say not only "grace," 
but "free grace." 

It is a sad, sad thing with some men that, the better the 
Lord deals with them in providence, the worse return they 
make. On the other hand, there are hearts that turn to 
the Lord when He smites them. 



spurgeon's gold. 151 

» 

By the blood of Christ we mean his suffering unto death, 
the obedience which made him yield His life, and especially 
the will of His soul to suffer and the object of His mind in 
suffering. 

It is a very remarkable fact, which I have heard asserted 
by many teachers, that children will learn to read out of 
the Bible better than from any other book. I scarcely know 
why ; it may, perhaps, be on account of the simplicity of 
the language ; but I believe it is so. 

I believe there are thousands of men who could go to the 
stake and die, or lay their necks on the block to perish with 
a stroke for Christ, who nevertheless find it hard work to 
live a holy, consecrated life. 

Where do they bury the bad people ? Right and left in 
our church-yard ; they seem all to have been the best of folks, 
a regular nest of saints ; and some of them so precious good 
it is no wonder they died — they were too fine to live in such 
a wicked world as this. 

If you cannot get on honestly, be satisfied not to get on. 

Fretful anxiety is forbidden to the Christian. 

We are renewed sinners, but we are sinners still. 

God cannot manifest himself to us if we continue in sin. 

Love thyself less and less and love thy God more, 

Faith is that blessed grace which is most pleasing to God. 

This present world must be subordinate to the world to 
come, and is to be cheerfully sacrificed to it if need be. 

Your frothy professors quote Dickens or George Eliot, 
but God's afflicted quote David or Job. 

You can sin yourself into an utter deadness of conscience, 
and that is the first wage of your service of sin. 

The one hundred and nineteenth Psalm is a very wonder- 
ful composition. Its expressions are many as the waves, 
but its testimony one as the sea. 

Loaded guns and quick-tempered people are dangerous 
pieces of furniture ; they don't mean any hurt, but they are 
apt to go off and do mischief before you dream of it. 



152 spurgeon's gold. 

Eternal life must be our possession now ; for if we die 
without it it will never be our possession in the world to 
come, which is not the state of probation but of fixed and 
settled reward. 

While you are brother to the worm and akin to corrup- 
tion you are, nevertheless, nearly related to Him who sitteth 
on the eternal throne. 

A deep experience is bound to resort to Scripture for its 
expression. Human compositions suffice for surface work, 
but when God's waves and billows have gone over us we 
quote a Psalm. 

I am afraid that many poor souls have remained in dark- 
ness, shut in within themselves, when two or three minutes' 
brotherly cheer might have taken down the shutters and let 
in the light of day. 

There comes a time with a man when it is not so much 
he that consumes the drink as the drink that consumes him; 
he is drowned in his cups — sucked down by that which he 
himself sucked in. 

Sometimes our corrupt nature quarrels with God about 
our service. The Lord says, " Go into the Sunday school. ' ' 
"I should have liked to preach," says the young man. 
"Go into the Sunday school." "Not so, Lord," says he, 
and he will not go, and thus he misses his life-work. It 
will not do for us to choose what work we will do. 

Teach children practical common-sense home duties as 
well as the three R's. 

We can bear a blow from an enemy, but a wound from 
our best friend is hard. 

The Lord can soon make the gay worldling into the de- 
sponding solitary. 

Those who boast of perfection will have much to grieve 
over when once they come to their senses and stand in 
truth before the living God. 

He that delights in God delights not only in God as He 
is but in all that God does, and this is a higher attainment 
than some have reached. 



spurgeon's gold. 153 

» 

I, for one, believe that the more the Word of God has 
been sifted the more fully has it been confirmed. 

We had better abstain from acts which serve no practical 
purpose, for in this life we have neither time nor strength 
to waste in fruitless action. 

Does he pretend to be a saint? Can he not drink with 
them as he once did ? He is a protest against their excesses, 
and men don't care for such protests. 

How often does it happen that children, though they are 
not angels, yet are used to do better work than angels could 
accomplish, for they sweetly lead their parents to God and 
heaven ! 

If young men would deny themselves, work hard, live 
hard, and save in their early days, they need not keep their 
noses to the grindstone all their lives, as many do. 

Rob a Christian of his faith and he will be like Samson 
when his locks were cut away ; the Philistines will be upon 
him and the Lord will have departed from him. 

We are prospering even when we lose our wealth if we 
grow in grace ; but we are in the direst adversity, even if 
we are growing rich, if we become spiritually poor. 

If we are to be acceptable before God there must be no 
keeping up of favorite sins — no sparing of darling lusts — no 
providing for secret iniquities ; our service will be filthiness 
before God if our hearts go after our sins. 

Some will come into God's house and undertake God's 
service during the Sabbath day, and yet during the week 
they are unjust, oppressive, graceless, and greedy — not serv- 
ants of God, but servants of self and sin. 

If there was anything rotten in the state of our salvation 
we should fear that it would fail us at last. But our foun- 
dation is sure, for the Lord has excavated down to the rock; 
He has taken away every bit of mere sentiment and sham 
and His salvation is real throughout. 

It is ill to be a saint without and a devil within. 

We shall be wise to make secular things sacred by trust- 
ing them with God. 



154 spurgeon's gold. 

When desires are so weighty that they burden our words 
and even crush them down, then are they most prevalent 
with God. 

Good men's memories sometimes fail them. 

Life without struggle and difficulty is thin and tasteless. 
How can a noble life be constructed if there be no difficulty 
to overcome, no suffering to bear ? 

You lay it down as a programme that you must be saved 
in that way or not at all. Is this right? Is this wise? Do 
you mean to dictate to the Lord? 

There is an old nature in us which fights against God 
still ; but the new nature, which is of divine origin, cries 
after God as a child after its mother. 

Let no man think of himself beyond his own experience. 
Experience is the true gauge ; and he who boasts of an un- 
tried faith is puffed up with vain glory. 

A fuller reward will be ours when the Lord shall come a 
second time and our bodies shall rise from the grave to 
share in the glorious reign of the descended King. Then 
in our perfect manhood we shall behold the face of Him 
we love and shall be like Him. 

It is a cruel thing to tease quick-tempered people, for, 
though it may be sport to you, it is death to them ; at least, 
it is death to their peace, and may be something worse. 

If thou be a child of God thou wilt as surely pray as a 
man breathes or as a child cries ; thou canst not help it. 

No dish ever comes to table which is so nauseous as cold 
religion. Put it away. Neither God nor man can endure it. 

That which made Dr. Guthrie ask for a " bairn's hymn " 
when he was dying is but an instinct of our nature, which 
leads us to complete the circle by folding together the ends 
of life. Childlike things are dearest to old age. 

Many matters are real difficulties to young believers 
which are no difficulties to us who have been longer in the 
way. You and I could clear up in ten minutes' conversa- 
tion questions and doubts which cause our uninstructed 
friends months of misery. 



spurgeon's gold. 155 

» 

The pendulum swings to and fro, advancing and retreat- 
ing, but yet there is a real progress made ; you cannot see 
it by watching the pendulum, but up higher on the face of 
the clock there is evidence of an onward march and of a 
coming hour. The kingdom of God is coming; right- 
eousness shall prevail. 

Better keep out of a quarrel than fight your way through 
it. 

Go from faith to faith and thou shalt receive blessing 
upon blessing. 

Take heed that you do not mistake whims of your own 
mind for the voice of God. 

Methinks one day with Christ was worth a half century 
with Moses. 

You must come into heart contact if you are to influence 
the man. 

If we never doubt till we have cause for doubting our life 
will be rich with faith. 

Some of us owed much to old-experienced Christians in 
our younger days. I know I did. 

The background of the cross is the judgment-seat of 
Christ. 

The best preservative under trial is increased spiritual 
life. 

If we once settled it in our minds that we would trust 
and not be afraid, what peace we should enjoy ! 

When we are at our worst let us trust with unshaking 
faith. Recollect that then is the time when we can most 
glorify God by faith. 

It does us much hurt to judge our neighbors, because it 
flatters our conceit, and our pride grows quite fast enough 
without feeding. We accuse others to excuse ourselves. 

Faith believes in God when there is nothing to support 
her but the bare promise. 

Poverty wants some things, luxury many things, but 
covetousness wants all things. 



156 spurgeon's gold. 

Everybody marks the nightingale above all other birds 
because she singeth when the other minstrels of the woods 
are silent and asleep ; and thus doth faith praise God un- 
der the cloud. 

Temporal things shall come to you in such proportion as 
you would yourself desire them if you were able to know all 
things and to form a judgment according to infinite wisdom. 

I was as restless once as those ever-flying birds which 
hover over the waters of the Golden Horn at Constantinople. 
They are never seen to rest, and hence men call them 
" lost souls." Such was I ! I found no place for the sole 
of my foot till I knew the Lord Jesus. 

I am not going to say which is first, the new birth or faith 
or repentance. Nobody can tell which spoke of a wheel 
moves first ; it moves as a whole. The moment the divine 
life comes into the heart we believe ; the moment we believe 
the eternal life is there. We repent because we believe and 
believe while we repent. 

God still guides His servants when they are willing to be 
guided. 

We sometimes know a great deal too much of what we 
ought not to know. 

Want of prayer is a great want indeed. 

Faithfulness requires plain speech. 

A man who has been helped out of a very severe trouble 
cannot forget his deliverer. 

Let us never think that we are perfect, so that we have no 
more to learn. 

Doubts and fears ill become the children of God. 

Let a man of God get side by side with a youth who knows 
the Scriptures and he feels "This is fit company for me." 

A great mistake is made when we suppose that this life is 
the time for meting out rewards and punishments. 

Grateful love cannot be restrained ; it is like fire in the 
bones. Our heart would break for love if it could not find 
a means of expressing itself at once. 



spurgeon's gold. 157 

A man who does not look well to his own concerns is not 
fit to be trusted with other people' s. Lots of folks are so busy 
abroad that they have no time to look at home. 

When a man's religion all lies in his saving his own self 
and in enjoying holy things for his own self there is a dis- 
ease upon him. 

Endurance works in the child of God a close clinging to 
God, which produces near and dear communion with Him. 

We count the thought of the present moment to be me- 
thodical madness, Bedlam out of doors ; and those who are 
furthest gone in it are credulous beyond imagination. 

There is no dynasty to follow His dynasty ; no successor 
to take up the crown of our Melchisedec. My immortal 
spirit rejoices in the hope of rendering endless homage to 
the eternal King. 

That atheistic philosophy which makes the whole world 
to be a chance production which grew of itself, or developed 
itself by some innate force, is a very dreary piece of fiction 
to the man who delights himself in the Almighty. 

Let us look back upon the whole of our past lives at this 
hour with a careful, leisurely glance, and see whether there 
is not enough in our diaries to condemn our doubts and 
bury our cares, or at least to shut up our anxieties in a cage 
made of the golden bars of past mercy and fastened in with 
jeweled bolts of gratitude. 

Hypocrites of all sorts are abominable. 

God sends the right messenger to the right man. 

The prayer of earth melts into the praise of heaven. 

To grow heavenly we must grow more believing. 

He lives most and lives best who is the means of imparting 
spiritual life to others. 

It is enough for a praying heart that it has a hearing God. 

The worst sort of clever men are those who know better 
than the Bible, and are so learned that they believe that the 
world had no Maker, and that men are only monkeys with 
their tails rubbed off. 



158 spurgeon's gold. 

We are to win influence over our fellow-men by an upright 
character and a generous behavior. 

This century's philosophy will one day be spoken of as 
an evidence that softening of the brain was very usual among 
its scientific men. 

If, in God's sense of the term, a man really prays we 
may know of a surety that he has passed from death unto 
life. 

If we are always ready for the Master's work we shall be 
surprised to find how beautifully he makes us fit in with His 
providence and His grace. 

He who, when he receives a message, delivers it at once, 
with the impression of his call fresh upon him, will deliver 
it with authority and power. 

At home we are unloaded of the world's huge load ; the 
tradesman takes off his apron, the warrior his harness, the 
bearer his yoke, for he is at home ; and if a man may rest 
anywhere on earth, it must surely be in his own habitation. 

Despondency, sickness, bereavement, loss, and even tem- 
poral death may fall upon the chosen as visitations of God 
to deliver them from the power of Satan. 

The Lord oftens brings His people away from their sins 
by giving them sharp and cutting experiences of what evil 
will do for them. If such be the present consequences of 
sin, they begin to guess what sin will bring them when they 
come into judgment and condemnation. 

There is a judgment passing upon nations, for as nations 
will not exist as nations in another world, they have to be 
judged and punished in this present state. The thoughtful 
reader of history wilL.not fail to observe how sternly this 
justice has dealt with empire after empire when they have 
become corrupt. 

That we live, is miraculous; that we die, is natural. 

Hearts that have often been traversed by the Gospel be- 
come like iron beneath its tread. 

If Christians are to be comforters they must learn the art 
of comforting by being themselves tried. 



spurgeon's gold. 159 

In 1865, Mr. Spurgeon, while on a visit to Hull, in York- 
shire, during the summer wrote the following poem : 

MARRIED LOVE. — TO MY WIFE. 

Over the space that parts us, my wife, 

I'll cast me a bridge of song ; 
Our hearts shall meet, O joy of my life, 

On its arch unseen but strong. 



The wooer his new love's name may wear 

Engraved on a precious stone ; 
But in my heart thine image I wear ; 

That heart has long been thine own. 

The glowing colors on surface laid 

Wash out in a shower of rain ; 
Thou need'st not be of rivers afraid, 

For my love is dyed ingrain. 

And as every drop of Garda's lake 

Is tinged with sapphire's blue, 
So all the powers of my mind partake 

Of joy at the thought of you. 

The glittering dewdrops of dawning love 

Exhale as the day grow r s old, 
And fondness, taking the wings of a dove, 

Is gone like a tale of old. 

But mine for thee, from the chambers of joy, 
With strength came forth as the sun, 

Nor life nor death shall its force destroy — 
Forever its course shall run. 

All earth-born love must sleep in the grave, 

To its native dust return ; 
What God hath kindled shall death outbrave 

And in heaven itself shall burn. 

Beyond and above the wedlock tie 

Our union to Christ we feel, 
Uniting bonds which were made on high 

Shall hold us when earth shall reel. 

Though He who chose us all worlds before 

Must reign in our hearts alone, 
We fondly believe that we shall adore 

Together before His throne. 



160 spurgeon's gold. 

Blessed is the man who has many spiritual children born 
to God under his ministry, for his converts are his defense. 

Let us not become men-pleasers, nor grieve inordinately 
because unreasonable persons are not satisfied with us. 

What a breath of peace cools the forehead of the man 
who remembers that he may pray, and that prayer is heard 
in heaven. 

Worldlings may like a Christian for certain externals ; they 
may admire him for certain advantages they get from him ; 
but as a Christian they cannot love him. 

We cannot comfort others if we have never been com- 
forted ourselves. I have heard — and I am sure that it is 
so — that there is no comforter for a widow like one who 
has lost her husband. 

The devil does not mind having half your heart. He 
is quite satisfied with that, because he is like the woman to 
whom the child did not belong ; he does not mind if it be 
cut in halves. 

Some people have just enough religion to make them mis- 
erable. If they had none, they would be able to enjoy the 
world; but they have too much religion to be able to enjoy 
the world, and yet not enough to enjoy the world to come. 

The man who does in reality what he seems to do ; the 
man who says what he means and means what he says; the 
man who is truthful, artless, and sincere in all his general 
dealings, both before God and man — he it is whose conduct 
leads us to hope that the light of grace shines within. 

Fret not over your heavy troubles, for they are the heralds 
of weighty mercies. 

Wherein I sin, that is my own ; but wherein I act rightly, 
that is of God, wholly and completely. 

Graces unexercised are as sweet perfumes slumbering in 
the cups of the flowers. 

None can make i 6 a ring ' ' or " a corner ' ' over the com- 
modity of heavenly truth. 

No ignorance is so terrible as ignorance of the Saviour. 



spurgeon's gold. 161 

Good men suffer when they are tempted, and the better 
they are the more they suffer. 

To have to fight this life-battle without Christ is sure 
defeat. 

If I had to die like a dog I should still wish to live the 
life of a Christian. 

The tendency of the human mind is to idolatry. 

God loves truth, and so do those who are renewed in 
heart. 

All God's servants belong to you all, and you must get 
all the good you can out of them. 

You are in Christ, and the Saviour saves you from your sins, 
but He has not promised that you shall have no sorrow. 

The Lord Jesus never overdrives a lame sheep, but He 
sets the bone and carries the sheep on his shoulders, so ten- 
derly compassionate is He. 

We should want to tarry here for ever, and say, "Lo, 
this is my home, " if it were not that an unkind world gives 
us aliens' treatment and forces us to feel that here we are 
in exile. 

If you see Jesus and abide in the light of His counte- 
nance habitually your faces, your characters, your lives, will 
grow resplendent, even without your knowing it. 

Do not attempt to go sneaking to heaven along some 
back lane; come into the King's highway; take up your 
cross and follow Him. I would persuade you to an open 
confession. 

There went a man out of this place one evening who was 
spoken to by one of our friends, who happened to know 
him in trade and had him in good repute. "What! have 
you been to hear our minister to-night? " The good man 
answered, "Yes, I am sorry to say I have." "But," said 
our friend, "why are you sorry? " "Why," he said, "he 
has turned me inside out and spoiled my idea of myself. 
When I went into the Tabernacle I thought I was the best 
man in Newington, but now I feel that my righteousness is 
worthless. 

lis 



162 spurgeon's gold. 

By passing through death our Lord has made a thorough- 
fare for us. We take death and the grave in transit now; 
they do not hinder our advance to glory and immortality 
and eternal life. 

The love of God the Father is a treasure-house of peace. 

To live without Christ is not life, but a breathing death. 

The cross which the Lord appoints you has no result but 
your good. 

Your Lord, among the treasures that He gives you, grants 
a cross. 

Read the Bible carefully, and then meditate and meditate 
and meditate. 

We shall not win success unless we hunt for it by careful 
lives. 

We cannot be too careful of our conduct if we aspire to 
be used of the Lord. 

He that has prayed for his breakfast values the providence 
which sent it. 

The Lord is very sensitive to the sorrows of His chosen 
and very quick to help them. 

The man who begins to exult over his fallen brother is 
the likeliest man to fall himself. 

Do not treat God's promises as if they were curiosities 
for a museum, but use them as every-day sources of comfort. 

Carnal objects are not helps to spiritual worship; they 
are snares to the mind and lead the heart away from God. 

The word of God is not defeated. Philosophy and heresy 
are in league and they gather their armies in haste. The 
Lord shall make them as the sheaves of the threshing-floor. 

If you ask, ' ' What is the highest wisdom upon the earth ?' y 
it is to believe in Jesus Christ, whom God has sent — to be- 
come His follower and disciple, to trust Him and imitate 
Him. 

It is an empty heart that the devil enters. You know 
how the boys always break the windows of empty houses ; 
and the devil throws stones wherever the heart is empty. 



spurgeon's gold. 163 

As workmen are moved to be more diligent in service 
when they hear their master's footfall, so, doubtless, saints 
are quickened in their devotion when they are conscious 
that He whom they worship is drawing near. He has gone 
away to the Father for a while, and so He has left us alone 
in this world; but He has said, "I will come again and 
receive you unto Myself," and we are confident that He 
will keep His word. 

Deliverance from pride will be a lasting gain to us. 

We have been "bought with a price," and henceforth we 
put in no claim to ourselves, for we belong absolutely to the 
Lord who bought us. 

The heart must be set upon its design. See how a child 
cries ! Though I am not fond of hearing it, yet I note that 
some children cry all over ; when they want a thing, they 
cry from the tips of their toes to the last hair of their heads. 
That is the way to preach, and that is the way to pray, and 
that is the way to live ; the whole man must be heartily en- 
gaged in holy work. 

One thing I have made up my mind to : whether I find 
present joy or present sorrow, present commendation or 
present censure, I will be faithful to my Lord. 

Only love seeks after love. If I desire the love of another 
it can surely only be because I myself have love toward him. 
We care not to be loved by those whom we do not love. 
It were an embarrassment rather than an advantage to re- 
ceive love from those to whom we would not return it. 
When God asks human love, it is because God is love. 

The man who has seen affliction when he is blessed of 
God has the disposition to cheer those who are afflicted. 

"Enter into thy closet, and when thou hast shut to the 
door, pray to thy Father that seeth in secret." That shut- 
ting of the door means that we are to seek secrecy and to 
prevent interruption. 

Temptation to sin is no sin, for in Him was no sin, and 
yet He was tempted. If you yield to the temptation, 
therein is sin ; but the mere fact that you are tempted, how- 
ever horrible the temptation, is no sin of yours. 



164 spurgeon's gold. 

I have been slenderly cheered by a large number of 
brethren who have greatly sympathized with me and helped 
me to fight the Lord's battles by bravely looking on. 

I have not a word to say against that scriptural prudence 
which bids us, like the ant, lay by in store for wintry times; 
but of the hunger to be rich, and of the selfish expenditure 
which forgets entirely that our substance is to be used for 
the glory of God, and that we are only stewards. 

If the second advent was to be a spiritual manifestation, 
to be perceived by the minds of men, the phraseology 
would be " Every mind shall perceive Him. ' ' But it is not 
so; we read, " Every eye shall see Him." Now, the mind 
can behold the spiritual, but the eye can only see that 
which is distinctly material and visible. The Lord Jesus 
Christ will not come spiritually, for in that sense He is al- 
ways here ; but He will come really and substantially, for 
every eye shall see Him, even those unspiritual eyes which 
gazed on Him with hate and pierced Him. 

The man that abhors evil and injustice ; the man that 
would do good if it cost him his earthly all ; the man who 
would not do wrong though the world should be his reward 
for doing it — this is the man who walks in the light, and 
he is the man that shall have fellowship with Goa and a 
sense of cleansing from sin. 

You that are tempted of the devil ; you that are troubled 
by mysterious whisperings in your ear ; you that, when you 
sing or pray, have a blasphemy suggested to you ; you that 
even in your dreams start with horror at the thoughts that 
cross your minds, be comforted, for your Lord knows all 
about temptation ! 

The God who is better to you than all your fears, yea, 
better than your hopes, perhaps intends the affliction to re- 
main with you until it lifts the latch of heaven for you and 
lets you into your eternal rest. 

In days to come you will bless God for the clouds and 
the darkness, since through them your tried faith grew into 
strong faith and your strong faith ripened into full assur- 
ance. Doubtless faith will make our nights the fruitful 
mothers of brighter days. 



spurgeon's gold. 165 

» 

A profession of scepticism is often nothing more than the 
whistling of the boy as he goes through the church-yard and 
is afraid of ghosts, and therefore " whistles hard to keep 
his courage up." They try to get rid of the thought of 
God because of that ghost of conscience which makes cow- 
ards of them all. 

Perhaps we put too much of our own explanation with 
the Lord's own word ; perhaps we have thought that clever 
illustrations were needful, and so have overlaid the truth 
with our poor imagination. 

One Paul standing in the sinking ship saves all from ruin 
by the majesty of his immovable courage ; and one Christ — 
such a Christ as ours — in the midst of a church turns a 
horde of cowards into an army of heroes. 

There is an essential difference between man's word and 
God's word, and it is fatal to mistake the one for the other. 
If you receive even the Gospel as the word of man you can- 
not get the blessing out of it, for the sweetness of the Gos- 
pel lies in the confidence of our heart that this is the Word 
of God. 

Faith is not merely believing facts but trusting to a per- 
son. God has set forth Christ to be a propitiation for sin; 
He becomes to me my propitiation when I trust Him. 

I remember a man, born blind, who loved our Lord most 
intensely, and he was wont to glory in this, that his eyes 
had been reserved for his Lord. Said he, " The first whom 
I shall ever see will be the Lord Jesus Christ. The first 
sight that greets my newly-opened eyes will be the Son of 
Man in his glory." 

To my mind it is one of the most delightful truths of 
Scripture, though so much neglected, that God's people are 
in covenant with God by a covenant of grace. 

We still get far too fond of the world. 

We are never without a Providence to observe. 

It is a happy day when a full Christ and empty sinners 
meet. 

God buries His workmen but His work goes on. 



166 spurgeon's gold. 

God will not have fellowship with any whose minds are 
crooked and deceitful. 

Those who speak lightly of faith are of a different mind 
from the Lord. 

Wherever there is a self-satisfaction which is afraid of 
light we suspect that the rat of hypocrisy is not far off. 

We are sorry for the friendless, but none are so forlorn 
as those who have not Jesus for a friend. 

When the world pretends to love, understand that it now 
hates you more cordially than ever and is carefully baiting 
its trap to catch you and ruin you. 

It was said once of the whole world that it was nothing 
better than a prison for the man who had offended Caesar ; 
and I may say of the great universe, however wide it be, 
that it is but a narrow cell for the man who has offended 
God. 

The wicked shall find that there are special sorrows for 
them — whips of scorpions for them, especially when they 
get farther on in life, and their youthful fires burn down to 
a black ash. Woe unto sinners when they have to reap the 
fruits of their evil deeds ! 

Have you a friend to whom you wish to make a present ? 
I know what you do — you try to find out what that friend 
would value, for you say, " I should like to give him what 
would please him. ' ' Do you want to give God something 
that is sure to please Him ? You need not build a church 
of matchless architecture ; I do not know that God cares 
much about stones and wood. You need not wait till you 
shall have amassed money to endow a row of almshouses. 
It is well to bless the poor, but Jesus said that one who gave 
two mites, which made a farthing, gave more than all the 
rich men who cast in of their wealth into the treasury. 
What would God my Father like me to give ? He answers, 
" My son, give Me thine heart." He will be pleased with 
that, for He Himself seeks the gift. 

It is a pleasant sight to see anybody thanking God ; for 
the air is heavy with the hum of murmuring, and the roads 
are dusty with complaints and lamentations. 



spurgeon's gold. 167 

» 

The God of all grace has ways of getting at human hearts 
when to our thinking every avenue is fast closed. 

Some men would wish to have themselves written down 
at a very high figure, but a cipher is quite sufficient. 

The best saints are poor things ; and as for some of us 
who are not the best, what poor, poor things we are. 

We have those around us who seem to think that great 
grace can only display itself by raving and raging. The 
religion of the quiet Jesus was never intended to drive us to 
the verge of insanity. 

Surely there is more righteousness in trusting the Lord 
than in all the works of the flesh. 

Go not away and dream, and say to yourself, "Oh, there 
is some spiritual meaning about all this. ' ' 

What a discovery it will be when, having struggled through 
one life of sorrow, you shall find yourself beginning another 
life of greater sorrow, which will never come to an end. 

There will come to godly men, sometimes, temptations to 
sin. The purest have been tempted to impurity ; the most 
devout have been tempted to blaspheme ; men full of integ- 
rity have been tempted to dishonesty, and the most truthful 
to falsehood. 

The devil's work is never done ; one word from the Lord, 
and it is all undone in a trice. 

Certain men never get on in business ; they do not like 
their trade, and so they never prosper. And certainly, in 
the matter of religion, no man can ever prosper if he does 
not love it, if his whole heart is not in it. 

Of all the devils in the world I hate a roaring devil least ; 
but a fawning devil is the worst devil that ever a man 
meets. 

Young men and women usually feel great interest in their 
fathers' lifestory — if it be a worthy one — and what they 
hear from them of their personal experience of the goodness 
of God will abide with them. 

It were a blessed thing to go through fifty hells to heaven 
if such a thing could be. 



168 spurgeon's gold. 

Weakness hurries, rages, shouts, for it has need to do so. 
Strength moves with its own deliberate serenity and effects 
its purpose. - 

You grow uneasy because near two thousand years have 
passed since His ascension, and Jesus has not yet come; but 
you do not know what had to be arranged for, and how far 
the lapse of time was absolutely necessary for the Lord's 
design. Those are no little matters which have filled up 
the great pause ; the intervening centuries have-teemed with 
wonders. 

Live upon Christ, who is the daily manna, and you will 
live well. 

Oh ! if ever a man ought to cling to Christ more than at 
any other time, it is when he is poor. 

I am sometimes startled at the power of a feeble prayer 
to win a speedy answer. 

Christ is not the cause of divine love, but the sweetest 
and best fruit of it. 

As we love the souls of men, we will spend our last breath 
in the defense of our Lord's substitution. 

The life of a genuine Christian is a perpetual miracle, 
which could be wrought by none but the Lord God. 

Any man can sing when his cup is full of delights ; the 
believer alone has songs when waters of a bitter cup are 
wrung out to him. 

The believer in the world finds himself like wheat under 
the flail, for so the text puts it, " In the world you shall have 
tribulation." 

When ungodly men are tempted the bait is to their taste, 
and they swallow it greedily. Temptation is a pleasure to 
them ; indeed, they sometimes tempt the devil to tempt 
them. 

The joy of salvation to us in that we are delivered from 
this present evil world, delivered from the lusts of the flesh, 
delivered from the old death of natural corruption, delivered 
from the power of Satan, and from the dominion of evil. 



spurgeon's gold. 169 

What our boys need in starting in this life is a God ; if we 
have nothing else to give them, they have enough if they 
have God. What our girls want in quitting the nurture of 
home is God's love in their hearts, and whether they have 
fortunes or not is a small matter. 

Now you are content to be a Christian ■ satisfied to mix 
with poor people in holy service ; quite pleased at an oppor- 
tunity of teaching in a ragged school. Ah ! but there may 
come a moment when Satan will show you the kingdoms of 
this world, and he will say, "All these will I give thee if 
thou wilt fall down and worship me ; ' ' and you may feel as 
if the service of Christ was not, after all, very respectable ; 
that you could do better in the world ; find choicer com- 
pany, enter more select society. But drive, drive these 
carrion-crows away. 

It is quite clear that men will not be universally converted 
when Christ comes, because if they were so they would not 
wail. 

Thanks be unto God for the tribulation which weans our 
thoughts from earth, and wins them for heaven, and let all 
the people say, "Amen." 

I would not have to go through life without a Saviour if 
I might be made an emperor. 

His saints shall be caught up together with Him in the 
clouds, to meet the Lord in the air; but to those who shall 
remain on earth the clouds shall turn their blackness and 
horror of darkness. 

When we meet with God we must be serious and resolute 
in His worship, and if difficulties arise we must encounter 
them with all our might, resolving that we will offer to God 
a sacrifice which shall not be torn by distracting influences. 

Human sympathy is the basket of silver to bear to me 
the golden apples of divine consolation. 

The Lord Jesus shall come to earth a second time as lit- 
erally as He has come a first time. 

If an enemy has said anything against your character it 
will not always be worth while to answer him. Silence has 
both dignity and argument in it. 



170 spurgeon's gold. 

I remember that a person came to me once and told me 
that she had prayed for affliction. I replied, "Dear soul, 
dear soul, do not be so foolish. You will have quite enough 
trouble without asking for it." 

Every hour that you listen to the Gospel and bar your 
heart against it you are less and less likely to admit it. 

There are no two exactly alike in all the family of God, 
and yet the likeness to the Elder Brother is to be seen more 
or less in each one. 

A congregation is a strange aggregate ; it is like the gath- 
erings of a net or the collections of a dredge. If it is a very 
large one it is specially remarkable. If anybody could 
write the histories of all gathered here the result would be 
a library of singular stories. 

There are ten thousand gates to death. One man is 
choked by a grape-stone, another dies through sleeping in 
a newly whitewashed room ; one receives death as he passes 
by a reeking sewer, another finds it in the best kept house 
or by a chill taken in a walk. Those who study neither 
to eat nor to drink anything unwholesome, nor go into 
quarters where the arrows of death are flying, yet pass away 
on a sudden, falling from their couch into a coffin, from 
their seat into the sepulchre. 

There is such a thing as carrying the cross till you are 
so accustomed to it that you would be almost uneasy with- 
out it. 

There cannot be anything comparable in the world to 
the service of God. 

Temptation is a mark of sonship rather than any reflec- 
tion thereupon. 

I cast myself upon the Lord alone, willing to be forsaken 
of all for the truth's sake. 

A lie to our fellow-men is meanness, bid a lie to God is 
madness. 

Enjoy the calm of heart which comes of knowing that 
the reserves of God are infinite, and that at any moment 
they can come and deliver us should an emergency occur. 



spurgeon's gold. 171 

» 

There cannot be anything so worthy of your noblest man- 
hood as to be truly the disciples of the Lord Jesus Christ. 

I knew a young lady — I think I know several of that sort 
now — whose heart I could never see. I could not make 
out why she was so flighty, giddy, frothy, till I discovered 
that she had kept her heart in a wardrobe. A poor prison 
for an immortal soul, is it not ? 

Many of God's people, by reason of a strong faith, are 
happier in their adversity than they were in their prosperity. 

You may come to beggary yet with all your inheritance 
if you cast off the fear of the Lord and fall into sin. 

When the pure Gospel is not preached God's people are 
robbed of the strength which they need in their life -journey. 

You can idolize a minister, you can idolize a poet, you 
can idolize a patron ; but in so doing you break the first 
and greatest of the commandments and you anger the Most 
High. He declares Himself to be a jealous God, and He 
will not yield His throne to another. 

To-day they deceive the people with the idle dream of 
repentance and restoration after death, a fiction unsupported 
by the least tittle of Scripture. 

When young men see an excellent person like you, so 
moral and amiable, without religion, they gather from your 
example that godliness is not absolutely needful, and take 
license to do without it. Thus you may be a curse where 
you little suspect it ; you may be encouraging others in the 
attempt to live without the Saviour. 

He that receives Christ also receives Christ's words. 

John warns us that if we say that which our characters do 
not support we lie. 

Children of light may for a time walk in the darkness of 
sorrow. 

Personal piety is the backbone of success in the service 
of God. 

To the untruthful mind the genuine is an invitation to 
be the counterfeit. 



172 spurgeon's gold. 

A religion which we will not submit to the test of exam- 
ination cannot be worth much. 

Between saying and being, between saying and doing, 
there may be all the difference in the world. 

The sacrifice of the Only-Begotten is the unique hope of 
sinners. 

It is an awful thing for a man to go from hell to hell ; 
to make this world a hell and then find another hell in the 
next world ! 

Those of us who can look back upon godly ancestors now 
in heaven must feel that many ties bind us to follow the 
same course of life. 

If you did not find. salvation in Him, then you would find 
that if earth cannot be heaven it can become marvelously 
like it. 

Our mistakes and blunders in the work usually originate 
in faults in the closet, faults in the family, faults in our own 
souls. If we were better our works would be better. 

Were you never startled with this, that if, in the preach- 
ing of the Gospel to-day, we were to bring to the Lord 
Jesus a person of high rank and another of the very lowest 
extraction, they have the same experience and upon the 
greatest of subjects they talk in the same way ? ' ' Oh, but, ' ' 
you say, " they pick up certain phrases." No, no ! They 
differ in speech ; the likeness is in heart and character. I 
frequently meet with converts who have not attended this 
place of worship more than half a dozen times, but they have 
been converted, and when they come to tell the story of their 
inner life you would suppose that they had been born and 
bred among us and had learned all our ways, for, though 
they do not use the phrases we use, yet they say the same 
things. The fact is, we are all alike lost and ruined, and 
we are born again in the same way, and we find the Saviour 
in the same way, and we rejoice in Him when we do find 
Him after much the same fashion and express ourselves very 
much after the same style. 

No man can be illustrious before the Lord unless his con- 
flicts be many. 



spurgeon's gold. 173 

O child of God, death hath lost its sting, because the 
devil's power over it is destroyed ! Then cease to fear dying. 

Christ Jesus is gold without alloy — light without dark- 
ness — glory without cloud. 

Doubts are dreary things in times of sorrow. Like wasps 
they sting the soul. 

As warm as is His love to sinners, so hot is His hatred 
of sin ; as perfect as is His righteousness, so complete shall 
be the destruction of every form of wickedness. 

Love is an exotic ; it is not a plant which will flourish 
naturally in human soil, it must be watered from above. 

One word of God is like a piece of gold, and the Chris- 
tian is the gold-beater, and can hammer that promise out 
for whole weeks. 

We see in Simon's carrying the cross a picture of the 
work of the Church throughout all generations ; she is the 
cross-bearer after Jesus. 

Christ exempts you from sin, but not from sorrow. Re- 
member that, and expect to suffer. 

It is a Christian's duty to force his way into the inner 
circle of saintship. 

Family worship is beyond measure important, both for 
the present and succeeding generations. 

Christ was "not of the world; " His life and His testi- 
mony were a constant protest against conformity with the 
world. 

The Christian should never think or speak lightly of un- 
belief. 

Christian ! it is contrary to every promise of God's pre- 
cious Word that thou shouldst ever be forgotten or left to 
perish. 

It is one of the arrangements of divine Providence that 
day and night shall not cease, either in the spiritual or 
natural creation, till we reach the land of which it is written, 
"There is no night there." 



174 spurgeon's gold. 

To be with Jesus, in the rest which remaineth for the 
people of God, is a cheering hope indeed, and to expect 
this glory so soon is a double bliss. 

Our griefs cannot mar the melody of our praise ; we 
reckon them to be the bass part of our life's song. 

All alterations and amendments of the Lord's own Word 
are defilements and pollutions. 

Christian, meditate much on heaven ; it will help thee to 
press on, and to forget the toil of the way. 

The nearer a man lives to God, the more intensely has 
he to mourn over his own evil heart ; and the more his 
Master honors him in His service, the more also doth the 
evil of the flesh vex and tease him day by day. 

So deep are our necessities that until we are in heaven 
we must not cease to pray. 

To know God is the highest and best form of knowledge. 

It is the easiest thing in the world to give a lenient ver- 
dict when one's self is to be tried \ but O, be just and true 
here. Be just to all, but be rigorous to yourself. 

The Lord Jesus is a deep sea of joy \ my soul shall dive 
therein, shall be swallowed up in the delights of his society. 

God's people are doubly His children ; they are His off- 
spring by creation, and they are His sons by adoption in 
Christ. 

Fiery spirits may dash forward over untrodden paths to 
learn fresh truth and win more souls to Jesus; but some of 
a more conservative spirit may be well engaged in remind- 
ing the Church of her ancient faith and restoring her faint- 
ing sons. 

What whips of burning wire will be yours when conscience 
shall smite you with all its terrors ! 

We can never be too confident when we confide in Him 
alone, and never too much concerned to have such a trust. 

Keep the altar of 'private prayer burning. This is the very 
life of all piety. 

When we give our hearts with our alms we give well. 



spurgeon's gold. 175 

When it is the Lord's work in which we rejoice, we need 
not be afraid of being too glad. 

Cautious pilots have no desire to try how near the quick- 
sand they can sail, or how often they may touch a rock 
without springing a leak ; their aim is to keep as nearly as 
possible in the midst of a safe channel. 

If we indulge in any confidence which is not grounded on 
the Rock of Ages our confidence is worse than a dream. 

Self must stand out of the way that there may be room 
for God to be exalted. 

Let us take the pure gold of thankfulness and the jewels 
oi praise and make them into another crown for the head 
of Jesus. 

It is marvelous that the Lord should regard those inter- 
mittent spasms of importunity which come and go with our 
necessities. 

The graces of the Christian character must not resemble 
the rainbow in its transitory beauty, but, on the contrary, 
must be established, settled, abiding. 

Have a love to all the saints, and add to that a charity 
which openeth its arms to all men and loves their souls. 

We only progress in sound living as we progress in sound 
understanding. 

How unwisely do those believers talk who make prefer- 
ences in the Persons of the Trinity. 

May your character not be a writing upon the sand, but 
an inscription upon the rock. 

Many professors give way to temper as though it were 
useless to attempt resistance ; but let the believer remember 
that he must be a conqueror in every point or else he con- 
not be crowned. 

If those who spend so many hours in idle company, light 
reading, and useless pastimes could learn wisdom they 
would find more profitable society and more interesting en- 
gagements in meditation than in the vanities which now 
have such charms for them. 



176 spurgeon's gold. 

We should all know more, live nearer to God, and grow 
in grace, if we were more alone. Meditation chews the cud 
and extracts the real nutriment from the mental food gath- 
ered elsewhere. 

We know that our enemies are attempting impossibilities. 
They seek to destroy the eternal life which cannot die while 
Jesus lives, to overthrow the citadel against which the gates 
of hell shall not prevail. 

Trouble does not necessarily bring consolation with it to 
the believer, but the presence of the Son of God in the fiery 
furnace with him fills his heart with joy. 

The soldier fights for his captain and is crowned in his 
captain's victory, so the believer contends for Christ and 
gets his triumph out of the triumphs of his Master. 

As love comes from heaven, so it must feed on heavenly 
bread. It cannot exist in the wilderness unless it be fed by 
manna from on high. Love must feed on love. The very 
soul and life of our love to God is His love to us. 

Fair is that lone star which smiles through the rifts of the 
thunder-clouds ; bright is the oasis which blooms in the wil- 
derness of sand ; so fair and so bright is love in the midst 
of wrath. 

If every day I journeyed towards the goal of my desires 
I should soon reach it, but backsliding leaves me still far off 
from the prize of my high calling and robs me of the ad- 
vances which I had so laboriously made. 

The assumed appearance of superior sanctity frequently 
accompanies a total absence of all vital godliness. The 
saint in public is a devil in private. 

' ' I am a Roman ! ' ' was of old a reason for integrity ; far 
more, then, let it be your argument for holiness, u Iam 
Christ's." ' 

Go to the river of thine experience and pull up a few 
bulrushes and plait them into an ark, wherein thine infant 
faith may float safely on the stream. Forget not what thy 
God has done for thee. 

Death's darts are under the Lord's lock, and the grave's 
prisons have divine power as their warder. 



spurgeon's gold. 177 

No one else shall have thy portion; it is reserved in 
heaven for thee, and thou shalt have it ere long, for there 
shall be no vacant thrones in glory when all the chosen are 
gathered in. 

You will not find on this side of heaven a holier people 
than those who receive into their hearts the doctrine of 
Christ's righteousness. 

"I will be their God." This is the masterpiece of all 
the promises; its enjoyment makes a heaven below, and 
will make a heaven above. 

Jesus is to believers the one pearl of great price, for whom 
we are willing to part with all that we have. He has so 
completely won our love that it beats alone for Him; to 
His glory we would live, and in defense of His gospel we 
would die ; He is the pattern of our life and the model after 
which we would sculpture our character. 

This alone is the true life of a Christian — its source, its 
sustenance, its fashion, its end, all gathered up in one word — 
Christ Jesus. 

There is a perfection yet to be realized, which is sure to 
all the seed. Is it not delightful to look forward to the 
time when every stain of sin shall be removed from the be- 
liever and he shall be presented faultless before the throne, 
without spot, or wrinkle, or any such thing? 

Did you lose Christ by sin? You will find Christ in no 
other way but by the giving up of the sin and seeking by 
the Holy Spirit to mortify the member in which the lust 
doth dwell. Did you lose Christ by neglecting the Scrip- 
tures? You must find Christ in the Scriptures. It is a true 
proverb, "Look for a thing where you dropped it; it is 
there." So look for Christ where you lost Him, for He 
has not gone away. 

The seasons change and thou changest, but thy Lord 
abides evermore the same, and the streams of His love are 
as deep, as broad, and as full as ever. 

Blessed is death, since it, through the divine power, dis- 
robes us of this work-day garment to clothe us with the 
wedding garment of incorruption. 

12 s 



178 spurgeon's gold. 

No greater eagerness will ever be seen among satanic tor- 
mentors than in that day when devils drag the hypocrite's 
soul down to perdition. 

Come what may, God's people are safe. Let convulsions 
shake the solid earth, let the skies themselves be rent in 
twain, yet amid the wreck of worlds the believer shall be 
as secure as in the calmest hour of rest. 

Believers who know Christ understand that delight and 
faith are so blessedly united that the gates of hell cannot 
prevail to separate them. 

Ungodly persons and mere professors never look upon 
religion as a joyful thing; to them it is service, duty, or 
necessity, but never pleasure or delight. 

The old nature is very active, and loses no opportunity 
of plying all the weapons of its deadly armory against new- 
born grace ; while, on the other hand, the new nature is ever 
on the watch to resist and destroy its enemy. 

I would have all those that hear of my great deliverance 
from hell and my most blessed visitation from on high 
laugh for joy with me. 

When the soul shall have understanding to discern all the 
Saviour's gifts, wisdom wherewith to estimate them, and 
time in which to meditate upon them, such as the world to 
come will afford us, we shall then commune with Jesus in a 
nearer manner than at present. 

Let us not imagine that the soul sleeps in insensibility. 
" To-day shalt thou be with me in Paradise," is the whis- 
per of Christ to every dying saint. 

Ours are its gates of pearl and walls of chrysolite ; ours 
the azure light of the city that needs no candle nor light 
of the sun ; ours the river of the water of life and the twelve 
manner of fruits which grow on the trees planted on the 
banks thereof; there is nought in heaven that belongeth 
not to us. "Things present, or things to come," all are 
ours. 

Be content to live unknown for a little while, and to walk 
your weary way through the fields of poverty or up the hills 
of affliction, for by and by you shall reign with Christ. 



spurgeon's gold. 179 

Sleep makes each night a Sabbath for the day. Sleep 
shuts fast the door of the soul and bids all intruders tarry 
for awhile that the life within may enter its summer garden 
of ease. The toil-worn believer quietly sleeps as does the 
weary child when it slumbers on its mother's breast. 

Morning devotion anchors the soul, so that it will not 
very readily drift far away from God during the day. 

Past experiences are doubtful food for Christians ; a pres- 
ent coming to Christ alone can give us joy and comfort. 

As the highest portraiture of Jesus, try to forgive your en- 
emies as He did. 

Bad nursing in their spiritual infancy often causes con- 
verts to fall into a despondency from which they never re- 
cover. 

We know of no cure for the love of evil in a Christian 
like abundant intercourse with the Lord Jesus. 

When the night lowers and the tempest is coming on the 
Heavenly Captain is always closest to His crew. 

It is a sweet thought that Jesus Christ did not come forth 
without His Father's permission, authority, consent, and 
assistance. 

Every individual believer is precious in the sight of the 
Lord ; a shepherd would not lose one sheep, nor a jeweler 
one diamond, nor a mother one child, nor a man one limb 
of his body, nor will the Lord lose one of His redeemed 
people. 

Above all other seasons a man needs his God when his 
heart is melted within him because of heaviness. 

Quail not before superior numbers, shrink not from diffi- 
culties or impossibilities, flinch not at wounds or death, 
smite with the two-edged sword of the Spirit and the slain 
shall lie in heaps. 

Sin a little thing? It girded the Redeemer's head with 
thorns and pierced His heart ! It made Him suffer anguish, 
bitterness, and woe. Could you weigh the least sin in the 
scales of eternity you would fly from it as from a serpent 
and abhor the least appearance of evil. 



180 spurgeon's gold. 

The devils are united as one man in their infamous re- 
bellion, while we believers in Jesus are divided in our serv- 
ice of God and scarcely ever work with unanimity. 

The breath of morn redolent of the smell of flowers is in- 
cense offered by earth to her Creator, and living men should 
never let the dead earth excel them. 

Think not that a long period intervenes between the in- 
stant of death and the eternity of glory. When the eyes 
close on earth they open in heaven. 

We should as soon think of printing a form for our chil- 
dren to use in addressing their parents as draw up a form 
to be offered to our Father who is in heaven. 

As for His failing you, never dream of it — hate the thought. 
The God who has been sufficient until now should be trusted 
to the end. 

He who rushes from his bed to his business and waiteth 
not to worship is as foolish as though he had not put on his 
clothes or cleansed his face, and as unwise as though he 
dashed into battle without arms or armor. 

We remain on earth as sowers to scatter good seed, as 
plowmen to break up the fallow ground, as heralds pub- 
lishing salvation. We are here as the " salt of the earth," 
to be a blessing to the world. We are here to glorify Christ 
in our daily life. We are here as workers for Him, and as 
" workers together with Him." 

May the horrible trinity of the world, the flesh, and the 
devil never overcome us. 

We have good reason, indeed, for hating evil when we 
look back and trace its deadly workings. Such mischief 
did evil do us that our souls would have been lost had not 
omnipotent love interfered to redeem us. 

Our prayers and efforts cannot make us ready for heaven 
apart from the hand of Jesus, who fashioneth our hearts 
aright. 

Let us charge ourselves to bind a heavenly forget-me-not 
about our hearts for Jesus our Beloved, and whatever else 
we let slip let us hold fast to Him. 



spurgeon's gold. 181 

It is the incessant turmoil of the world, the constant at- 
traction of earthly things, which takes away the soul from 
Christ. 

The Christian knows no change with regard to God. He 
may be rich to-day and poor to-morrow; he may be sickly 
to-day and well to-morrow; he may be in happiness to-day, 
to-morrow he may be distressed — but there is no change 
with regard to his relationship to God. If He loved me 
yesterday, He loves me to-day. My unmoving mansion of 
rest is my blessed Lord. 

Labor to impress thyself with a deep sense of the value of 
the place to which thou art going. If thou rememberest that 
thou art going to heaven, thou wilt not sleep on the road. 
If thou thinkest that hell is behind thee and the devil pur- 
suing thee thou wilt not loiter 3 

Ye unknown workers, who are occupied for your Lord 
amid the dirt and wretchedness of the lowest of the low, 
be of good cheer, for jewels have been found upon dung- 
hills ere now, earthen pots have been filled with heavenly 
treasure, and ill weeds have been transformed into precious 
flowers. 

He who loves truth must hate every false way. 

Far superior to the jealousy, selfishness, and greed, which 
admit of no participation of their advantages, Christ deems 
His happiness completed by His people sharing it. 

Being born in a Christian land and being recognized as 
professing the Christian religion is of no avail whatever, 
unless there be something more added to it — the being 
"born again" by the power of the Holy Spirit. 

We do our Lord an injustice when we suppose that He 
wrought all his mighty acts and showed Himself strong for 
those in the early time, but doth not perform wonders or 
lay bare His arms for the saints who are now upon the earth. 

Prayer is the lisping of the believing infant, the shout of 
the lighting believer, the requiem of the dying saint falling 
asleep in Jesus. It is the breath, the watchword, the com- 
fort, the strength, and honor of a Christian. 



182 spurgeon's gold. 

The Holy Spirit makes men penitents long before He 
makes them divines ; and he who believes what he knows 
shall soon know more clearly what he believes. 

As you grow downward in humility seek also to grow 
upward, having nearer approaches to God in prayer and 
more intimate fellowship with Jesus. 

Jesus Christ is Himself the sum and substance of the 
covenant, and as one of its gifts He is the property of every 
believer. 

Desire is insatiable as death, but He who filleth all in all 
can fill it. The capacity of our wishes who can measure ? 
but the immeasurable wealth of God can more than over- 
flow it. 

He who grows not in the knowledge of Jesus refuses to 
be blessed. 

Spiritual light has many beams and prismatic colors, but 
whether they be knowledge, joy, holiness, or life, all are 
divinely good. 

Let me be on my guard when the world puts on a loving 
face, for it will, if possible, betray me, as it did my Master, 
with a kiss. 

In our Christian pilgrimage it is well, for the most part, 
to be looking forward. Forward lies the crown, and on- 
ward is the goal. Whether it be for hope, for joy, for con- 
solation, or for the inspiring of our love, the future must, 
after all, be the grand object of the eye of faith. 

You have too frequently had a view of your own heart to 
dream for a moment of any perfection in yourself. But 
amid this sad consciousness of imperfection, here is com- 
fort for you — you are "perfect in Christ Jesus.' 1 In God's 
sight, you are "complete in Him;" even now you are 
6 ' accepted in the beloved. ' ' 

When a person is dear everything connected with him 
becomes dear for his sake. 

The distance between glorified spirits in heaven and mili- 
tant saints on earth seems great; but it is not so. We are 
not so far from home — a moment will bring us there. 



spurgeon's gold. 183 

» 

Calm endurance answers some questions infinitely more 
conclusively than the loftiest eloquence. 

Abba, Father ! He who can say this hath uttered better 
music than cherubim or seraphim can reach. There is 
heaven in the depth of that word — Father ! There is all I 
can ask \ all my necessities can demand ; all my wishes can 
desire. I have all in all to ail eternity when I can say, 
"Father." 

Christian ! do not dishonor your religion by always wear- 
ing a brow of care. 

Whatever thou art, thou hast nothing to make thee proud. 
The more thou hast, the more thou art in debt to God ; and 
thou shouldst not be proud of that which renders thee a 
debtor. 

Trouble is often the means whereby God delivers us. 
God knows that our backsliding will soon end in our dis- 
truction, and He in mercy sends the rod. 

How often are the saints of God downcast and sad ! I do 
not think they ought to be. I do not think they would if 
they could always see their perfection in Christ. 

Here, rest is but partial ; there, it is perfect. Here, the 
Christian is always unsettled ; he feels that he has not yet 
attained. There, all are at rest ; they have attained the 
summit of the mountain ; they have ascended to the bosom 
of their God. Higher they cannot go. Ah, toil-worn 
laborer, only think when thou shalt rest forever. 

When a Christian grasps a promise, if he do not take it 
to God he dishonors Him ; but when he hastens to the 
throne of grace and cries, "Lord, I have nothing to rec- 
ommend me but this, 'Thou hast said it,' " then his desire 
shall be granted. Our heavenly Banker delights to cash 
His own notes. 

However difficult and painful thy road, it is marked by 
the footsteps of thy Saviour ; and even when thou reachest 
the dark valley of the shadow of death, and the deep waters 
of the swelling Jordan, thou wilt find His footprints there. 

We need not teach men to complain; they complain fast 
enough without any education. 



184 SPURGEON S GOLD. 

God's promises were never meant to be thrown aside as 
waste paper ; He intended that they should be used. God's 
gold is not miser's money, but is minted to be traded with. 
Nothing pleases our Lord better than to see His promises 
put in circulation ; He loves to see His children bring them 
up to Him and say, "Lord, do as Thou hast promised." 

Brother, hush that murmur, natural though it be, and con- 
tinue a diligent pupil in the College of Content. 

If none of God's saints were poor and tried we should 
not know half so well the consolations of divine grace. 

The spade of trouble digs the reservoir of comfort deeper, 
and makes more room for consolation. 

If thou wouldst know the path of duty, take God for thy 
compass; if thou wouldst steer thy ship through the dark 
billows, put the tiller into the hand of the Almighty. 

Sin will yield to nothing less potent than the blood of 
Him whom God hath set forth as a propitiation. 

This vale of tears is but the pathway to the better coun- 
try ; this world of woe is but the stepping-stone to a world 
of bliss. 

The Ruler of providence bears a pair of scales; in this 
side He puts His people's trials, and in that He puts their 
consolations. When the scale of trial is nearly empty you 
will always find the scale of consolation in nearly the same 
condition ; and when the scale of trial is full you will find 
the scale of consolation just as heavy. 

No promise is of private interpretation. Whatever God 
has said to any one saint He has said to all. When He 
opens a well for one it is that all may drink. When He 
openeth a granary door to give out food, there may be some 
one starving man who is the occasion of its being opened, 
but all hungry saints may come and feed too. 

If I neglect prayer for never so short a time, I lose all 
the spirituality to which I had attained ; if I draw no fresh 
supplies from heaven, the old corn in my granary is soon 
consumed by the famine which rages in my soul. 

Just so far as the Lord shall give us grace to suffer for 
Christ, to suffer with Christ, just so far does he honor us. 



spurgeon's gold. 185 

» 

You can recollect the sayings of great men • you treasure 
up the verses of renowned poets ; ought you not to be pro- 
found in your knowledge of the words of God, so that you 
may be able to quote them readily when you would solve a 
difficulty or overthrow a doubt? 

A daily portion is all that a man really wants. We do 
not need to-morrow' s supplies ; that day has not yet dawned, 
and its wants are as yet unborn. 

Contentment is one of the flowers of heaven, and if we 
would have it, it must be cultivated ; it will not grow in us 
by nature; it is the new nature alone that can produce it, 
and even then we must be specially careful and watchful 
that we maintain and cultivate the grace which God has 
sown in us. 

We have been compelled to go to God for our souls as 
constant beggars asking for everything. Bear witness, chil- 
dren of God, you have never been able to get anything for 
your souls elsewhere. 

No joy can excel that of the soldier of Christ ; Jesus re- 
veals Himself so graciously and gives such sweet refresh- 
ment that the warrior feels more calm and peace in his 
daily strife than others in their hours of rest. 

It is quite right to desire to depart, if we can do it in the 
same spirit that Paul did, because to be with Christ is far 
better ; but the wish to escape from trouble is a selfish one. 

Anxiety makes us doubt God's loving-kindness, and thus 
our love to Him grows cold ; we feel mistrust, and thus 
grieve the Spirit of God, so that our prayers become hin- 
dered, our consistent example marred, and our life one of 
self-seeking. 

If thou wilt murmur against the chastening, take heed, 
for it will go hard with murmurers. God always chastises 
His children twice, if they do not bear the first stroke pa- 
tiently. 

The anvil breaks a host of hammers by quietly bearing 
their blows. 

Rest assured that we have already experienced more ills 
than death at its worst can cause us. 



186 spurgeon's gold. 

Whenever a man is about to stab religion he usually pro- 
fesses very great reverence for it. Let me beware of the 
sleek-faced hypocrisy which is armor-bearer to heresy and 
infidelity. 

He who does not long to know more of Christ knows 
nothing of Him yet. Whoever hath sipped this wine will 
thirst for more, for although Christ doth satisfy, yet it is 
such a satisfaction that the appetite is not cloyed but 
whetted. 

Be thou ever one of those whose manners are Christian, 
whose speech is like the Nazarene, whose conduct and con- 
versation are so redolent of heaven that all who see you 
may know that you are the Saviour's, recognizing in you 
His features of love and His countenance of holiness. 

Favorite children are often the cause of much sin in be- 
lievers ; the Lord is grieved when he sees us doting upon 
them above measure ; they will live to be as great a curse 
to us as Absalom was to David, or they will be taken from 
us to leave our homes desolate. If Christians desire to 
grow tfiorns to stuff their sleepless pillows, let them dote 
upon their dear ones. 

Good for evil, recollect, is godlike. 

Every hour has its duty ; do thou continue in thy calling 
as the Lord's servant until He shall suddenly appear in His 
glory. 

Very frequently anger is the madman's firebrand. 

Grasp the sweet promises, thresh them out by meditation, 
and feed on them with joy. 

Keep out that monster itnbelief. 

Learn, dear reader, to glorify the Lord by leaving no 
means untried, if by using them thou wouldst not dishonor 
the name of the Lord. 

We know not what prayer cannot do ! 

Every day should be the birthday of the Saviour to a re- 
newed soul. 

A goodly man often grows best when his worldly circum- 
stances decay. 



spurgeon's gold. 187 

» 

Blistered, leprous, filthy lips may touch the stream of di- 
vine love ; they cannot pollute it, but shall themselves be 
purified. 

He who follows Christ for his bag is a Judas ; they who 
follow for loaves and fishes are children of the devil ; but 
they who attend Him out of love to Himself are His own 
beloved ones. 

You are meddling with Christ's business and neglecting 
your own when you fret about your lot and circumstances. 

If an angel should fly from heaven and inform the saint 
personally of the Saviour's love to him the evidence would 
not be one whit more satisfactory than that which is borne 
in the heart by the Holy Ghost. 

Men will attend to the most multiplied and minute cere- 
monial regulations, for such things axe pleasing to the flesh; 
"but true religion is too humbling, too heart-searching, too 
thorough for the tastes of carnal men; they prefer some- 
thing more ostentatious, flimsy, and worldly. 

The first promise ran thus : ' ' The seed of the woman, ' ' 
not the offspring of the man. Since venturous woman led 
the way in the sin which brought forth Paradise lost, she, 
and she alone, ushers in the Regainer of Paradise. 

Though dishonest as the thief, though unchaste as the 
woman who was a sinner, though fierce as Saul of Tarsus, 
though cruel as Manasseh, though rebellious as the prodigal, 
the great heart of love will look upon the man who feels 
himself to have no soundness in him, and will pronounce 
him clean when he trusts in Jesus crucified. 

More wealth brings more care, but more grace brings 
more joy. 

Human action is frequently the hasty result of passion or 
fear, and is followed by regret and alteration. 

A man may have too much money or too much honor, 
but he cannot have too much grace. 

If we would be eminently useful, we must not be content 
with forming schemes in our heart and talking of them ; 
we must practically carry out ' ' whatsoever our hand findeih 
to do." 



188 spurgeon's gold. 

One good deed is of more worth than a thousand brilliant 
theories. 

There is no purer or more thrilling delight to be known 
this side of heaven than that of having Christ's joy fulfilled 
in us, that our joy may be full. 

Tale-bearing emits a threefold poison ; for it injures the 
teller, the hearer, and the person concerning whom the tale 
is told. 

We have no other time in which to live. The past is 
gone ; the future has not arrived ; we never shall have any 
time but time present. 

The Holy Spirit permits us to censure sin, and prescribes 
the way which we are to do it. It must be done by rebuk- 
ing our brother to his face, not by railing behind his back. 
This course is manly, brotherly, Christ-like, and, under 
God's blessing, will be useful. 

He who wraps a thread-bare coat about a good conscience 
has gained a spiritual wealth far more desirable than any 
he has lost. 

Saints know that a grain of heart' s-ease is of more value 
than a ton of gold. 

Losses, crosses, heaviness, sickness, poverty, and a thou- 
sand other ills are of the Lord's sending, and come to us 
with wise design. 

God's smile and a dungeon are enough for a true heart; 
His frown and a palace would be hell to a gracious spirit. 

Satan may worry, but he cannot destroy us. 

Our religion is not to be confined to our closet ; we must 
carry out into practical effect that which we believe. 

No faith is so precious as that which lives and triumphs 
in adversity. 

7? is for home that we work and labor. The thought of 
it gives strength to bear the daily burden and quickens the 
fingers to perform the task. 

Be most in those engagements which you have experiment- 
ally proved to draw you nearer to Christ. 



spurgeon's gold. 189 

Sin may drag thee ever so low, but Christ's great atone- 
ment is still under all. You may have descended into the 
deeps, but you cannot have fallen so low as "the utter- 
most;" and to the uttermost He saves. 

This is the joy we have to-day, that we are saved in Him ; 
and if this joy be satisfying, wherefore should we think of 
changing ? Who barters gold for dross ? 

Duplicity is abominable with God, and hypocrisy his 
soul hateth. 

Christ will be all or nothing. 

Prayers are instantly noticed in heaven. 

Let us move in the common affairs of life with studied 
holiness, diligence, kindness, and integrity. 

A backslider, if there be a spark of life left in him, will 
groan after restoration. 

To forget to praise God is to refuse to benefit ourselves; 
for praise, like prayer, is one great means of promoting the 
growth of the spiritual life. It helps to remove our burdens, 
to excite our hope, to increase our faith. 

Praise should always follow answered prayer. 

A primary qualification for serving God with any amount 
of success and for doing God's work well and triumphantly 
is a sense of our own weakness. 

Those who serve God must serve Him in His own way 
and in His strength or He will never accept their service. 

The soul-enriching path of prayer is open to the very 
weakest saint. 

All the strength supplied to us by our gracious God is 
meant for service. 

The nearest place to the gate of heaven is the throne of 
the heavenly grace. 

There is not a promise in the Word which shall be with- 
held. 

Earth hath no words which can set forth the holy calm 
of a soul leaning on Jesus' bosom. 



190 spurgeon's gold. 

Our first faith — that simple faith by which, having noth- 
ing, we become possessors of all things. 

What we have known of our faithful God proves that He 
will keep us to the end. 

Sincere repentance is continual. Believers repent until 
their dying day. 

He can labor without present reward who looks for a re- 
ward in the world to come. 

Some Christians are living on Christ, but are not so anx- 
ious to live for Christ. 

To many saints old age is the choicest season in their 
lives. 

How heart-cheering to the believer is the delight which 
God has in His saints ! 

From the altar of age the flashes of the fire of youth are 
gone, but the more real flame of earnest feeling remains. 

When we repent of sin we must have one eye upon sin 
and another upon the cross, or it will be better still if we 
fix both our eyes upon Christ, and see our transgressions 
only in the light of His love. 

Saints will not be out of place in heaven ; their beauty 
will be as great as that of the place prepared for them. 

A true prayer is an inventory of wants, a catalogue of ne- 
cessities, a revelation of hidden poverty. 

Love should give wings to the feet of service and strength 
to the arms of labor. 

Every attribute of God should become a fresh ray in the 
sunlight of our gladness. 

We have the earnest of our inheritance in the comforts of 
the Spirit, which are neither few nor small. Inheritors of 
joy forever, we have foretastes of our portion. 

Prayer is in itself, apart from the answer which it brings, a 
great benefit to the Christian. 

In the family register of glory the small and the great are 
written with the same pen. 



spurgeon's gold. 191 

Present afflictions tend to heighten future joy. There 
must be shades in the picture to bring out the beauty of the 
lights. 

Scripture is a never-failing treasury filled with boundless 
stores of grace. It is the bank of heaven ; you may draw 
from it as much as you please, without let or hindrance. 

The Psalms show us that God's people in, olden times 
were wont to think much of God's actions, and to have a 
song concerning each of them. So let God's people now 
rehearse the deeds of the Lord. 

We must confess that we are "nothing else but sin," for 
no confession short of this will be the whole truth ; and if 
the Holy Spirit be at work with us, convincing us of sin, 
there will be no difficulty about making such an acknowledg- 
ment — it will spring spontaneously from our lips. 

The best of men are conscious, above all others, that 
they are men at the best. 

We shall never find happiness by looking at our prayers, 
our doings, or our feelings ; it is what fesus is, not what we 
are, that gives rest to the soul. 

The jewels of a Christian are his afflictions. The regalia 
of the kings whom God hath anointed are their troubles, 
their sorrows, and their griefs. 

There is nothing which can so assist you to walk towards 
heaven with good speed as wearing the image of Jesus on 
your heart to rule all its motions. 

Ah ! poor religion, thou has been sorely shot at by cruel 
foes, but thou hast not been wounded one-half so danger- 
ously by thy foes as by thy friends. 

Be content with thine own lot if thou canst not better it, 
but do not look upon thy neighbor and wish that he were 
as thyself. 

The man who, with pretenses, enters the fold, being nought 
but a wolf in sheep's clothing, worries the flock more than 
the lion outside. 

Inconsistent professors injure the Gospel more than the 
sneering critic or the infidel. 



192 spurgeon's golb. 

It is not thy hold of Christ that saves thee — it is Christ ; 
it is not thy joy in Christ that saves thee — it is Christ ; it is 
not even faith in Christ, though that be the instrument — it 
is Christ's blood and merits. 

Turn to sacred history and you will find that scarcely ever 
did a great mercy come to this world unheralded by sup- 
plication. 

Empty boats float high, but heavily-laden vessels are low 
in the water ; mere professors can boast, but true children 
of God cry for mercy upon their unprofitableness. 

God's people have their trials. It was never designed 
by God when He chose His people that they should be an 
untried people. 

Wickedness arrays itself in fair garments and imitates the 
language of holiness, but the precepts of Jesus, like His 
famous scourge of small cords, chase it out of the temple and 
will not tolerate it in the church. 

Hope itself is like a star — not to be seen in the sunshine 
of prosperity and only to be discovered in the night of ad- 
versity. 

God often takes away our comforts and our privileges in 
order to make us better Christians. He trains His soldiers, 
not in tents of ease and luxury, but by turning them out 
and using them to forced marches and hard service. He 
makes them ford through streams and swim through rivers, 
and climb mountains and walk many a long mile with heavy 
knapsacks of sorrow on their backs. 

Afflictions are often the black foils in which God doth 
set the jewels of His children's graces to make them shine 
the better. 

Banquet your faith upon God's own Word, and whatever 
your fears or wants repair to the Bank of Faith with your 
Father's note of hand, saying, " Remember the word unto 
Thy servant, upon which Thou hast caused me to hope. ' ' 

Be not contented with this unspeakable blessing for thy- 
self alone, but publish abroad the story of the cross. Holy 
gladness and holy boldness will make you a good preacher, 
and ail the world will be a pulpit for you to preach in. 



spurgeon's gold. 193 

A Christian should be a striking likeness of Jesus Christ. 
You have read lives of Christ, beautifully and eloquently 
written ; but the best life of Christ is His living biography, 
written out in the words and actions of His people. 

Some Christians are sadly prone to look on the dark side 
of everything, and to dwell more upon what they have gone 
through than upon what God has done for them. 

We have many ungratified desires at present, but soon 
every wish shall be satisfied, and all our powers shall find 
the sweetest employment in that eternal, world of joy. 

Consider the history of the Redeemer's love and a thou- 
sand enchanting acts of affection will suggest themselves, 
all of which have had for their design the weaving of the 
heart into Christ and the intertwisting of the thoughts and 
emotions of the renewed soul with the mind of Jesus. 

Some men profess a great deal ; but we must not believe 
any one unless we see that his deeds answer to what he 
says. 

There is no weapon half so deadly as a Judas kiss. 

If there be one name sweeter than another in a believer's 
ear it is the name of Jesus. Jesus ! it is the name which 
moves the harps of heaven to melody. Jesus ! the life of 
all our joys. If there be one name more charming, more 
precious than another, it is this name. It is woven into 
the very warp and woof of our psalmody. Many of our 
hymns begin with it, and scarcely any that are good for 
anything end without it. It is the sum total of all delights. 
It is the music with which the bells of heaven ring ; a song 
in a word ; an ocean for comprehension, although a drop 
for brevity ; sl matchless oratorio in two syllables ; a gath- 
ering up of the hallelujahs of eternity in five letters. 

The sea is made of drops, the rocks are made of grains ; 
and the sea which divides thee from Christ may be filled 
with the drops of thy little sins ; and the rock which has 
well nigh wrecked thy bark may have been made by the 
daily working of the coral insects of thy little sins. 

Whatever our morning's need may be, let it like a strong 
current bear us to the ocean of divine love. 

13 s 



194 spurgeon's gold. 

It is fondly imagined by some that it must have involved 
very special privileges to have been the mother of our Lord, 
because they suppose that she had the benefit of looking 
into His very heart in a way in which we cannot hope to do. 
There may be an appearance of plausibility in the supposi- 
tion, but not much. We do not know that Mary knew 
more than others ; what she did know she did well to lay up 
in her heart; but she does not appear from anything we 
read in the Evangelists to have been a better-instructed be- 
liever than any other of Christ's disciples. All that she 
knew we also may discover. Do you wonder that we should 
say so? Here is a text to prove it: "The secret of the 
Lord is with them that fear Him, and He will show them 
His covenant.'' 

We may not make sure that the Lord will at once remove 
all disease from those we love, but we may know that believ- 
ing prayer for the sick is far more likely to be followed by 
restoration than anything else in the world; and where this 
avails not, we must meekly bow to His will by whom life 
and death are determined. 

God is oftener in little huts than in rich palaces. 
God would have us put on a cheerful courage. 
Every position has its duties. 
Happy are we if we live in your supplications. 

It is not only at the commencement of the Christian life 
that believers have reason for song ; as long as they live they 
discover cause to sing in the ways of the Lord. 

The obedience which God's children yield to Him must 
be loving obedience. 

I had need to beware of lean prayers, lean praises, lean 
duties and lean experiences, for these will eat up the fat of 
my comfort and peace. 

He who cannot calmly leave his affairs in God's hand, 
but will carry his own burden, is very likely to be tempted 
to use wrong means to help himself. 

Upstarts frequently usurp the highest places, while the 
truly great pine in obscurity. 



spurgeon's gold. 195 

The Christian who has learned to live by faith is inde- 
pendent of man, even in temporal things; for his contin- 
ued maintenance he looks to the Lord his God and to Him 
alone. 

Divine grace can make the coward brave. 

It is sweet to die in the Lord ; it is a covenant blessing 
to sleep in Jesus. 

Our sanctification is a long and continued process, and 
we shall not be perfected till we lay aside our bodies and 
enter within the veil. 

As speeds the ship towards the port, so hastes the believer 
towards the haven of his Saviour's bosom. 

Let us not fall into the error of letting our passions and 
carnal appetites ride in triumph, while our nobler powers 
walk in the dust. 

Praise makes worship complete, and without it the pillar 
of devotion lacks its capitaj. 

A knowledge of doctrine will tend very much to confirm 
faith. 

Thine acceptance is not in thyself but in thy Lord ; thou 
art as much accepted of God to-day, with all thy sinfulness, 
as thou wilt be when thou standest before His throne, free 
from all corruption. 

A life of misery is usually the lot of those who are united 
in marriage, or in any other way of their own choosing, 
with the men of the world. 

While there are distinctions as to the persons in the Trin- 
ity, there are no distinctions of honor. 

If we truly love Christ we shall care for those 'who are 
loved by Him. Those who are dear to Him will be dear 
to us. 

We are engaged in a great war with the Philistines of evil. 
Every weapon within our reach must be used. 

Hold Christian company and you will be kept wakeful 
by it and refreshed and encouraged to make quicker prog- 
ress in the road to heaven. 



196 spurgeon's gold. 

Never blush to own your religion ; your profession will 
never disgrace you ; take care you never disgrace that. 

No prayer is half so hearty as that which comes up from the 
depths of the soul through deep trials and afflictions. 

Death is no longer banishment ; it is a return from exile, 
a going home to the many mansions where the loved ones 
already dwell. 

Faith is the road, but communion with Jesus is the well 
from which the pilgrim drinks. 

Care, even though exercised upon legitimate objects, if 
carried to excess, has in it the nature of sin. 

In order to become spiritually vigorous we must seek the 
spiritual good of others. 

We often find, in attempting to teach others, that we 
gain instruction for ourselves. 

What the sun is to the day, what the moon is to the night, 
what the dew is to the flower, such is Jesus Christ to us. 

We do not know what tender sympathies we possess until 
we try to dry the widow's tears and soothe the orphan's 
grief. 

There are no broken friendships nor blighted prospects 
in heaven. Poverty, famine, peril, persecution, and slan- 
der are unknown there. 

All means are good and decorous when faith and love 
are truly set on winning souls. 

We have latent talents and dormant faculties which are 
brought to light by exercise. 

What gracious lessons some of us have learned at sick 
beds. We went to teach the Scriptures; we came away 
blushing that we knew so little of them. In our converse 
with poor saints we are taught the way of God more per- 
fectly for ourselves and get a deeper insight into divine 
truth. 

Our strength for labor is hidden even from ourselves 
until we venture forth to fight the Lord's battles or to climb 
the mountains of difficulty. 



spurgeon's gold. 197 

Art thou afraid of hell ? He has barred it against the 
advent of any of His children ; they shall never see the gulf 
of perdition. Whatever foes maybe before the Christian 
they are all overcome. 

David was an able master of the human heart, because he 
had been tutored in the best of all schools — the school of 
heart-felt, personal experience. 

May we all have grace to maintain in our own proper 
way the purity of the Church as being an assembly of be- 
lievers and not a nation, an unsaved community of uncon- 
verted men. 

Little faith will save a man, but little faith cannot do 
great things for God. 

Measure our love by our intentions and it is high indeed ; 
'tis thus, we trust, our Lord doth judge of it. 

Prayer cannot draw down answers from God's throne 
except it be the earnest prayer of the man who believes. 

To know Him is "life eternal," and to advance in the 
knowledge of Him is to increase in happiness. 

He who is not angry at transgression becomes a partaker 
In it. 

Our piety is our pleasure, our hope is our happiness, our 
duty is our delight. 

It augurs for us a day of grace when we begin betimes 
with God ; the sanctifying influence of the season spent upon 
the mount operates upon each succeeding hour. 

The life of a believer is a series of miracles wrought by 
"the mighty God." 

Would to God that the daily turmoil were less vehement — 
that we had more time and heart for praising the name of 
the Lord. 

Your prayers, and your repentances, and your tears — the 
whole of them put together — are worth nothing apart from 
Him. " None but Jesus can do helpless sinners good;" 
or helpless saints either. 

Delight and true religion are as allied as root and flower. 



198 spurgeon's gold. 

The love of Christ in its sweetness, its fullness, its great- 
ness, its faithfulness, passeth all human comprehension. 

There is no hope of prevalence with God unless we abase 
ourselves that He may exalt us in due time. 

The common mercies we enjoy all sing of love, just as the 
sea-shell, when we put it to our ears, whispers of the deep 
sea whence it came ; but if we desire to hear the ocean 
itself, we must not look at every-day blessings, but at the 
transactions of the crucifixion. 

There will be no doubt about his having chosen you when 
you have chosen Him. 

Religion is calculated to give a man happiness below as 
well as bliss above. 

Absence from Christ is hell ; but the presence of Jesus is 
heaven. 

No Christian has enjoyed perpetual prosperity; no believer 
can always keep his harp from the willows. 

Winds and waves will not spare us, but they all obey Him ; 
and, therefore, whatever squalls may occur without, faith 
shall feel a blessed calm within. 

If Christ were only a cistern, we might soon exhaust His 
fullness. But who can drain a fountain? 

A Christian man should so shine in his life that a person 
could not live with him a week without knowing the Gospel. 

His mercy is so great that it forgives great sin to great 
sinners, after great lengths of time, and then gives great 
favors and great privileges, and raises us up to great enjoy- 
ments in the great heaven of the great God. 

There is nothing little in God ; His mercy is like Him- 
self — it is infinite. 

It may seem an easy thing to wait, but it is one of the 
postures which a Christian soldier learns not without years 
of teaching. Marching and quick marching are much easier 
to God's warriors than standing still. 

The wreckers of Satan are always abroad, tempting the 
ungodly to sin under the name of pleasure. 



spurgeon's gold. 199 

Show the world that thy God is worth ten thousand 
worlds to thee. 

The moment we glorify ourselves, since there is room for 
one glory only in the universe, we set ourselves up as rivals 
to the Most High. 

May our hearts make Jesus their anchor, their rudder, 
their light-house, their life -boat, and their harbor. 

A Christian ought to be a comforter, with kind words on 
his lips and sympathy in his heart ; he should carry sunshine 
wherever he goes and diffuse happiness around him. 

There are the common frames and feelings of repentance, 
and faith, and joy, and hope which are enjoyed by the en- 
tire family; but there is an upper realm of rapture, of com- 
munion, and conscious union with Christ which is far from 
being the common dwelling-place of believers. 

The master-works of God are those men who stand in 
the midst of difficulties steadfast and unmovable. 

It is scant love which the fire of persecution can dry up. 

All that nature spins time will unravel, to the eternal 
confusion of all who are clothed therein. 

If you would find the men who serve God the best, you 
must look for the men of the most faith. 

Let your goodness be the only fault they can discover in 
you. 

A great sin cannot destroy a Christian, but a little sin 
can make him miserable. 

Sin is a loathsome and hateful thing, and no renewed 
heart can patiently endure it. 

There is gold in the rocks which fringe the Pass of the 
Splugen, gold even in the stones which mend the roads, 
but there is too little of it to be worth extracting. Alas, 
how like too many books and sermons ! Not so the Scrip- 
tures — they are much fine gold ; their very dust is precious. 

Get nearer to Jesus, and you will find yourself linked 
more and more in spirit to all who are, like yourself, sup- 
ported by the same heavenly manna. 



200 spurgeon's gold. 

Our heavenly Father sends us frequent troubles to try our 
faith. If our faith be worth anything, it will stand the test. 
Gilt is afraid of fire, but gold is not ; the paste gem dreads 
to be touched by the diamond, but the true jewel fears no 
test. 

When God worketh without instruments doubtless He is 
glorified ; but He hath Himself selected the plan of instru- 
mentality as being that by which He is most magnified in 
the earth. 

Why is it that some Christians, although they hear many 
sermons, make but slow advances in the divine life ? Be- 
cause they neglect their closets and do not thoughtfully 
meditate on God's Word. 

Once let the truth of God obtain an entrance into the 
human heart and subdue the whole man unto itself, no 
power, human or infernal, can dislodge it. 

When we are hard beset with this world, or with the se- 
verer trials within the Church, we find it a most blessed* 
thing to pillow our head upon the bosom of our Saviour. 

Our God has a method in providence by which he can 
succeed our endeavors beyond our expectation, or can defeat 
our plans to our confusion and dismay. 

We will not forswear the sun till we find a better light, 
nor leave our Lord until a brighter lover shall appear; and, 
since this can never be, we will hold Him with a grasp im- 
mortal, and bind His name as a seal upon our arm. 

Men trust good stewards with larger and larger sums, and 
so it frequently is with the Lord; He gives by cart-loads to 
those who give by bushels. 

In a very wide sphere of observation I have noticed that 
the most generous Christians of my acquaintance have been 
always the most happy, and almost invariably the most pros- 
perous. 

Christ has paid the debt of His people to the last jot and 
tittle, and received the divine receipt; and unless God can 
be so unjust as to demand double payment for one debt, 
no soul for whom Jesus died as a substitute can ever be sent 
into hell. 



9 



